Many have marked the fact that it has been one year since our lives changed dramatically due to the Covid-19 pandemic. A year. We’ve almost become accustomed to this way of life.

What have we learned during our isolation? What has our ‘time out’ taught us? How are we managing our emotions? Who are our helpers? What lessons will we be carrying forward? How will we allow ourselves to be changed in our next chapter?

March 16, 2020.

On Wednesday, as I was leaving work, I heard a parent ask our center director what our plan was as the coronavirus epidemic became more serious. I kind of shrugged my shoulders and walked out the door. I figured it would all blow over while I was out for a couple of days to help my mom recover from shoulder replacement surgery.

By the time I arrived at my mom’s house two hours later, the NCAA had determined that March Madness would be played without spectators. Before I went to sleep that night, our governor had ordered all Michigan schools closed for three weeks. The next day, all NCAA sports for the rest of the season were cancelled, Disneyland closed, and all of us entered a new reality.

Each day brings more closures, more cancellations, and more restrictions. Most of us have been impacted at work, at school, or at home. Some have had to reconfigure their daily lives for the foreseeable future.

Consider a two-parent family with three school-aged children who regularly rely on day care and school while both parents go to work. When the schools and the day care close indefinitely, what are they to do? What if they are doctors? police officers? paramedics? nurses?

Or consider a single father who counts on his hourly wage to support his small child. What if his place of business closes for the next several weeks? How will he earn money to pay his rent or mortgage? to buy food and diapers?

People in all kinds of unexpected situations are scrambling! What will they do?

Since I’ve been away from my normal life for the last few days, I’ve been able to pause and observe the varied responses of the people I have interacted with in person, over the phone, through email, and on social media.

I’ve been a bit removed.

I haven’t been, like many, scrambling at work trying to determine how to sanitize, shut down, and communicate an action plan. I haven’t had the necessity to trouble-shoot child care or purchase extra groceries or devise a work-at-home strategy.

Many of you have been in the middle of all that, and I applaud you. You are doing the hard things and figuring it out.

I watched one family hire a displaced child care worker to care for their young children who can not go to school or day care for a few weeks. I’ve seen my workplace switch all of our in-person students to an online platform in the space of one 8-hour day, even while they met the immediate instructional needs of all of our students. I saw our church community first adapt our worship gatherings and then shift course to cancel all gatherings and then begin rallying our troops to reach out and meet the needs of those in our city.

You all are showing up, caring for one another, and rising to the occasion.

We can do that — we can rise to this occasion!

While all of this bustling was going on, my mom and I were looking for something to do as she sat in her chair resting and icing. She suggested we watch A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood with Tom Hanks playing Mr. Fred Rogers, beloved children’s television icon. I couldn’t help but be touched as I saw Mr. Rogers’ character teach the journalist who was interviewing him about appropriate ways to express emotion — how to manage fear and anger and sadness.

Aren’t we afraid and angry and sad? We’re angry that the store has run out of the things that we need. We’re afraid to go to work where we might get sick or unknowingly share a virus we might be carrying. We’re afraid of staying home for so long. We’re sad our plans — for trips, gatherings, and celebrations — are being cancelled for who knows how long. And what will we do with all those feelings?

Will we isolate? Will we lash out at those closest to us? Will we find ways to express how we’re feeling? Will we talk it out? write it down? cry?

I see some of you asking the hard questions — is this an overreaction? isn’t the flu even more dangerous than Covid 19? is this just the media’s attempt to whip us into a frenzy? And, I hear you. It does seem extreme.

However, whether we think the recommendations are overblown or not, they have moved beyond recommendations to directives. We’ve been told to create social distance, to avoid gatherings, and to stay at home. Nevertheless, even when the World Health Organization, the Centers for Disease Control, and our governmental leaders all say to “shelter in place,” we still have some choices.

We can choose what to do with our feelings about this. We can grumble about how ridiculous all of it is; we can piss and moan and shake our fists in the air. We can push against the communal flow, or we can turn.

And maybe we need to.

It seems to me that for quite some time many of us have found ourselves positioned against one another, pointing fingers and shouting accusations. We’ve argued over everything from healthcare to guns to sexuality to abortion. We’ve gotten really good at converting our fear, our anger, and our sadness into attacks on each other. And how’s that been working out for us?

Do we feel good about the distance we’ve created with all this finger-pointing and name calling? How would we respond to our children acting this way? Would we allow them to continue, or would we give them a time out?

As we are forced to pause our lives in the midst of a political climate that is so emotionally charged, are we being offered a communal time out?

What if this virus, this quarantine, this season is an opportunity for us to check ourselves? What if being stopped dead in our tracks is giving us an opportunity to see that we’ve lost our way? What if we pause inside our homes, look at the people that we love, and decide that we can do better than we’ve been doing? What if we can choose right now to care for others regardless of the differences we’ve had with them in the past?

Mr. Rogers said that his mother responded to scary news by telling him to ‘look for the helpers’. This week I have seen many helpers. I’ve seen you reaching out to one another, being creative, and finding ways to encourage one another. You’re posting cheerful videos, providing suggestions for stay-at-home activities, and cheering one another on. I saw one dear old friend post a video of himself reading The Cat in the Hat and challenging others to post videos of themselves reading their favorite stories.

That’s the kind of people you are — the kind who show up in difficult situations to care for friends, strangers, and even those who tend to annoy you.

While I was cheering my mom on this week — encouraging her to exercise, helping her get dressed, and offering her ice cream cones — the world around was feeling a little chaotic, and still friends brought food, family delivered flowers, and others made phone calls, offered prayers, and provided guidance.

Many were helpers.

I think one way that I’ll deal with stress, fear, disappointment, and anger in the coming weeks is by watching how all of you show up for each other. I’ll be looking for the helpers and learning from them during this time out.

Turn from evil and do good; seek peace and pursue it.

Psalm 34:14