Day 28

Sunny Wednesday coffee in front of the fountains in the gardens of the Palais Royal. 

After having taken a break for a few days because of immense fatigue, here I am again. Typing, just typing, because I can. 

I have not known fatigue like this in a long time. A fatigue that takes me and binds me to the bed, despite me and my will. 

Underneath there is also an anxiety, a desperation that claws at me about all the things that I am not doing, that I am missing. I feel it tie up my chest, making it difficult for me to breathe. I want to cry and scream, in an effort to release some tension—any tension—but I cannot.

I close my eyes and I am taken back into the dark again. It’s not sleep because my brain is running a mile a minute. I try to will myself to stop it but instead of stopping, my brain just flies off to another corner. I hear voices, I see faces, some that I recognise, some that I do not. I call out to no one in particular that I want this to stop. I want to stop feeling this way but obviously it does not. The dark continues to wrap me up in its embrace, immobilising me, taking away with it my strength and willpower. I want to go, to just do anything, to stretch, but this is bigger than me and I have no choice but to give in to it.

I can feel a chill settle around me despite the layers of wool that I am wrapped up in. And with it, a soreness. Without warning the chill turns to heat and I am suddenly clammy. 

Despite it all the tightness in my chest doesn’t leave, reminding me that I have responsibilities and a list of things to do that just keeps extending. I can’t find the energy in me to type, to write, to knit the only thing that convinces me that I am not going through a depression is that I can still find the energy to wash and dress myself. And to cook and to eat. But beyond that, I have not much else to keep me going. Where has it all gone? 

As I am typing I look around and 90% of the people around me are without their masks. It is beyond ridiculous. We are sitting in such close proximity to one another with the wind blowing. We seem to think that we are special, somehow immune to this virus that does not discriminate and does not choose its victims based on any standard that we know.

I stop myself and let my ears focus on what’s coming through: music through my headphones, the fountain and wasps. It is soothing, in a way that white noise is soothing. I can see two wasps hover around me as I write. They stop me from moving my arms and my fingers. They bumble around, trying to bump into my arm, almost trying to make me give way.

Is this a metaphor?

_{Image: Beyond the Window Box}

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