This text was written as I learn to live with Long Covid and attempt to regain my creativity. All the posts and some more info can be found here.
Spring has become a difficult time of year. I am drawn to the outdoors, to the flourishing of plants, the exuberance of greens. I want to follow suit, to cycle, to garden, to visit places, to flourish too. I cannot remember when my body started to follow the seasons, maybe it always did and I only noticed late. A few years back, I learned to cherish this process, to give myself to silence and quiet growth in winter, to burst into energy in spring, to forget about sleep in summer, and find myself exhausted and waning in autumn, to finally return to the quiet nurturing of winter.
The last few months have been different. I did launch into life last spring. I took my bicycle to Scotland and cycled about, learning about curlews, skylarks, lapwings, hooded crows, gannets, seaweeds, and many more kin. I reacquainted myself to my body and the health of it only to find it crashing as summer came. My fatigue grew and grew and grew and so did my pain. I remember days lying on the sofa waiting for the GP to call me back about the latest round of blood tests as my body ripped itself apart. I let go of any illusion to join the flamboyance of summer life and waited for the pain to pass. It did, eventually, as I was referred to the long covid clinic and answers revealed themselves. I waned with autumn, my mental health fading to a point I had never wanted to meet again, but then, with support and care and the healing darkness of winter, I recovered. I did not leave long covid behind but I learned to live with it. It told me to slow and so I did. Winter made it easy. I could stay in bed long. I could read for a bit and vegetate on the sofa to rest, to rest, to rest.
I knew then of the dangers of spring. I prepared for them. I made firm rules to guide me through this changed life. I was foolish. Spring did as spring does and I got swept into their embrace. I cycled too much too far. I gardened too long too hard. I booked myself to too many things knowing full well I should not. It's spring, my brain insisted on telling me, they'll awaken you, sway with you and breathe life into you. They did not.
I crashed for two weeks, I flirted with crashes for two more weeks. I lost my ability to read, my chest tightened in warning of pain to come, my legs cramped and pinched in a reminder of what they can do to me, medication or not.
And so here I am, past Beltane and bustling with raw fiery energy and yet in need of winter's stillness. I return to the books I have left behind. The words are blurred so I switch to my notes that still need transcribing neatly. This much I can do. I flick through the overstuffed catalogue of Netflix and bookmark shows and films I can half sleep to. I find music to relax to on Qobuz and remember to meditate. I sleep before sundown and wake past sunrise. I am out of sync, uncertain how to be of this world when all I can do is sit and write and read and return to the honed habits of winter.
I am sure there is a different path, a way for me to be part of spring without giving my body to it (suggestions are welcomed). I just have not figured out yet. I cannot figure out what that new way is either until I rest, until I let go of the frenzy of light and growth to find steady ground beneath my feet, to return to a clarity of mind currently hidden in a sea of long covid fog.
So this month, I rest. I cancel my few plans, painful as it is. I rest. I reset. I remember I am ill, I am disabled.
