One Year Later: reflections on the Coronacrisis

I can remember exactly where I was when the American space shuttle Columbia exploded in January 1986. I remember perfectly what I was doing when someone told me about that first plane crash on September 11, and of course, I recall all the horror of watching the entire attack develop before our eyes on TV screens. On a personal level, I can remember phone calls informing me of deaths or dangerous situations for my immediate family members. I know the pain of that one moment that changes everything.

But the Coronacrisis (and yes, I may have coined that word myself) didn’t have such a dramatic point in history, although I would argue that its effects have been much greater. Today is the one-year anniversary of our “state of alarm” which continues to this day in Spain. The world changed, not in a moment, but in a series of decisions. First the little corner stores here were suddenly closed; then the schools announced a closure the following day; then the nation announced the state of alarm, and restaurants began to close on Friday, March 13, and we were locked down—a word I’d never even heard used before— by Monday, March 16. And somewhere in there, we were trying to figure out how to still have church on Sunday, believing it would only be two weeks until it was all over. Seventy days later, we were free to leave our homes again, but 365 days later, we’re still living under restrictions, perimeter closures, and travel bans.

After a year of the Coronacrisis, I was reflecting on things I’ve felt and learned over the past year:

Walking outside that first day was like visiting the set of a zombie movie.  Everything was closed up and there were no people anywhere.  I wouldn’t have been surprised to see a tumbleweed rolling down the street, like the ghost towns of the American frontier.  It feel eerie and unsettling.  And part of the drama of it all was sudden change, overnight.  It’s unsettling to know that from one day to the next your whole world can change, and the things that you see every day(restaurants, traffic, and people on the sidewalk) could disappear.  I think the most disquieting thing was how alone I felt.  There were times I was the only person in a metro car or the only person on a street (in a major city of the world).  And a mask on my face, especially at the beginning, made me feel even more invisible.  Even when there were people in the store, no one spoke.  Everyone was silently moving through the aisles without making eye contact or human connection.  

It made me realize that what mattered most wasn’t the groceries or anything else so tangible.  I need food to live, of course, but the biggest need was (and still remains to some extent) human contact.  We joked amongst ourselves about those who were “lucky enough” to have big windows to see the world outside.  Those who were “rich enough” to have a balcony or a tiny square of patio had a level of interaction everyone else could only dream of.  We saw other people only at 8 pm as we went to the windows to clap each night, and it felt like a reunion of family and friends to wave at one another from our windows.  I remember when they finally allowed children to go outside (for one hour, staggered differently from others).  I was walking the store to stand in line for groceries and a mother passed with her toddler in a stroller.  The baby was jabbering and pointing and saw me and said clearly, “¡Hola!” and waved at me.  I smiled and waved and burst into tears as soon as I got past them.  The need for human contact was overwhelming to me in that moment.  Touching one another was—and still is—forbidden, but it didn’t change the fact that we’re created for that type of interaction. I still needed friendship, companionship, and emotional connection. 

One of the ways I compensated came almost accidentally. As the country prepared for lockdown, I found some funny memes and shared them in my instagram stories.  They made me laugh, and I needed to find the humor in a truly horrifying situation.  But because of our need for emotional connection, I suddenly had a following —everyone I knew was messaging me about the memes and how much they needed to laugh!  How the best part of their day was lying in bed scrolling through the memes and cracking up.  How they identified so much with the humor, the everything else felt uncertain and uncomfortable.  I never intended to be the “meme queen” that others have dubbed me; it just filled the need for laughter and relationship when all else fell apart.  People still send me memes to reshare almost every day.

Having nothing to look forward to, and no end in sight was hard.  I had never realized how much I needed that conference in the calendar or that dinner date with friends to keep me going, until suddenly we had nothing to anticipate, nothing to mark a future when things would be better.  We’re a year on, and I’m still working through it.  I still desperately need a vacation, and have no means or opportunity to take one. 

But I do have hope, and hope is a HUGE thing.  I still have faith.  I have my private journals and my public writing, forming a “permanent record” which helps me appreciate how far we’ve actually come in one year.  I still have gratitude that God brought us through the worst and I have confidence that He’ll bring us to the end, as well.  I’ve grown spiritually through this, learning to trust God with my pain as much as with my joy.  

And not everything was bad!  I know my neighbors by name now. I think that using QR codes for information was genius, and I don’t really ever need to be handed a physical menu again.  I’m glad that gross people learned how to cover their mouths when they cough and sneeze (even if it’s only the social pressure of everyone glaring at them). I have awesome memories of this past year. I gained a lot more knowledge on tech stuff—didn’t we all!— and I’ll probably keep using most of it as I advance into more digital ministry.  I was forced into some things that turned out to be immense blessings, and I’m still expecting God to “redeem” many other aspects of life in the past year as time continues.

For now, I’ll keep reflecting, and I’ll probably share the best memes again, as they come up in my FB memories each day. I’ll wear my mask, wash my hands, and wait for the day when this will be just a memory.