A few weeks before coronavirus took over the media cycle, I found myself a little bored with the simplicity and ease of life. I was deep in the editing phase on a historical fiction novel set 400 years in the past where my characters faced very different problems than I did.
They faced problems of survival. Mending injuries on the fly. Finding food where none was provided. Searching for safety, sprinting for sanctuary, afraid for their lives.
And I have to admit that I found myself a little jealous. From my desk chair, with my romanticized perspective on the past, I was a little pissed off to be sitting at a computer, paid to write and read and edit, easily ordering food the moment I wanted it, spending my time not cutting logs or gathering food but typing words on a page. I guess I wanted some of the adventure in the life I had written for my characters...
So, I complained to my husband. Life is so easy now, I said, that things have lost their meaning. Significance is reduced when you don't work for something, when all you have to do to get what you want is decide you want it. "Steak for dinner? Order it." vs "Steak for dinner? Go shoot something, skin it, chop it up, and let's find a viable storage solution so we can preserve it for the next few weeks too" (and what if you're on the run -- then it must be easy to pack and transport, too!).
Then I got a taste of what I complained about lacking. Coronavirus blew up and borders started to shut down just as we returned to the country. We scrambled to find a place to ride out the storm, hurried to secure a rental car, and drove 20 hours to get to safety. We slept in our car! It was terrible, gross, sweaty, and took forever -- and also it was a little bit awesome.
Once we got to safety, I spent about fifteen hours figuring out how to get groceries delivered to the somewhat remote (what is not remote when you live in Manhattan, though?) location. Multiple deliveries failed, we were briefly without food, and I had to cook some interesting things I've never tried before simply because we didn't have the comforts of our "usuals." I commented to my husband that I felt like a modern "pioneer woman," having spent 15-20 hours in one week to ensure food.
So, yeah, this sucks. I would trade the frustration and adventure to go back to the "Before Times" and reclaim all of the lives and jobs lost. But, that's not something I get to decide, and so I am trying to remind myself that this is an adventure. None of the historical figures I write about got to choose which tragedy, which war, which plague they lived through. Neither do I.
