Mad Run

Since we got quarantined, I have found myself tunneling hard into work. Start on Monday and and go on till Friday like the week was an extended day with breaks for meals, sleep and exercise. At first, I attributed it to the newness of the overall experience and not having any demarcation between work and life. Reading about how others are coping with their mandatory work from home status made me wonder if we are all afraid to fall off some allegorical cliff we paused from being "productive". We seem to have the need to prove our usefulness first to ourselves and then to anyone who cares to observe or judge. 

Advisories abound on how to cope with the "new normal" a phrase that I have a deep problem with because I cannot gauge the sentiment behind it. It is an exhortation to get with the program or it is mark of resignation and accepting that life changes from here on out in a final, permanent sort of way. Either way, I don't think I can get on board. I want to keep doing what I always did in difficult times work so hard and so long that I have no mental capacity to worry or brood over what I have no ability to change. It is like running away as far and as fast as I can from a raging, engulfing fire. There is a presumption there that one will be able to come out of it alive. To accept the "new normal" would fly in the face of such a mad run.