On COVID-19 and Quarantine Life

So far 2020 has been quite the trip. We're only a couple of days into April, but I feel like so many monumental things have been happening lately, both in general and personally speaking. Right now, life for just about everyone in the world is all about the novel coronavirus and the potentially deadly disease that it causes, COVID-19. 

These were things I'd technically heard of the last time I posted here in that I knew they were big deals in China, as well as several countries in Europe. We also knew there were a few cases here in the United States, but I simply assumed COVID-19 would be like Ebola, or the swine flu, or the bird flu, or any of those other super-bugs that made headlines and then disappeared long before they ever managed to touch my life. I didn't think it was even worth paying attention to at the time, let alone actually worrying about or planning for. After all, that sort of thing was for conspiracy theorists and paranoid people like my father and brother, right?

Cut to today. Most of the country is on partial or total lockdown to slow the spread of the virus because it's been spreading relentlessly, as well as killing people right and left. Monterey County, as well as the whole state of California, is under a shelter-in-place order, meaning we're all supposed to stay at home unless we absolutely need to go do something essential like buy groceries or go to the doctor. Non-essential businesses are either closed or struggling to adapt to doing business at a distance. Until very recently, people were panic-buying shelf-stable groceries and essential goods (e.g. toilet paper, beans, and pasta) to the point where grocery store shelves were bare. Even Amazon was out of stock on such things.

Keeping On, Writing On

And the adventures continue as far as writing goes, mostly to my delight and advantage. I'm not quite sure where we're standing at present with all the AB-5 stuff, but supposedly there are some changes coming up that will end a lot of the hassle, at least for writers. In particular, that ridiculous 35-article cap is supposed to be done away with, and some of the ambiguous language is set to be clarified. I'm hoping that will mean I can stop stressing over this soon and go back to writing for a living in some kind of peace.

Thankfully the initial BKA termination that hurt so badly was the only full-on firing I personally had to deal with. One of the two newer platforms I joined and had been using eventually did have to limit us to 35 articles per year per client just to play it really safe. However, they also made it crystal clear they were planning on supporting California writers through all this, and they said they'd remove the limits as soon as they possibly could.

That will probably happen within the next couple of weeks or so when the amendment goes through, and I'm eagerly looking forward to it. I really love that platform, and I'm hoping to be able to write there more often in the future, so it will be nice to be able to do that to whatever extent I want. The other platforms I've been using here and there haven't said or done anything to make me believe I have more walking papers in my immediate future, so that's been good for my peace of mind as well.

I still think about BKA sometimes, as well as many of the projects I worked on through them. There's a part of me that hopes when things stabilize a bit and people are no longer afraid to contract with California writers, I'll be able to work with them again, but I'll be fine if that never happens. Some of the opportunities I discovered while shopping around for replacements for BKA have been so positive, it's hard to be upset. If anything, I'm a little miffed at them for giving me the boot the way they did, especially in light of how supportive so many other platforms have been, but that's a whole other issue.

On the Departure of a Former Friend and Continued Writing Success

The passage of time is a really weird thing, especially when it comes to other people that are part of your life to varying degrees. The older I become and the more I change with the years, the less connected I feel to the people I used to know on whatever level. I've never been the most social person in my offline life, but I was relatively communicative and friendly online for a long while. Probably why changes in my online social life spark more reflection on this front.

I'm especially confused by a lot of my friendships with other women, both online and off. Most women are socialized to be a lot less direct and straightforward than men, so I'm never quite sure where I stand with a lot of them. There have always been at least a few who seem really conflicted as far as how they feel about me. I'll pick up on definite interest and admiration, but also an undercurrent of something darker. Jealousy or resentment, maybe. Something competitive gone completely sour.

I often feel like such acquaintances are secretly rooting for me to fail, especially if their goals and dreams for themselves intersect with mine at all, as if there's a limited amount of success to go around and they feel I'm getting more than my share. I never know what to do about people that give off that vibe -- that they don't root for me to win or cheer for me when I do. I don't like feeling like people I know are sitting around wishing evil or misfortune into my life, but I also feel like I'm not patient enough with people and cut others off way too quickly. I'm trying to be less like that, especially as I get older, so more often than not, I just let people hang around, but distance myself to stay off of their radar as much as possible.

This morning, I noticed that one of these women apparently unfriended me on Facebook over the weekend. I haven't been posting anything inflammatory lately, nor have I been leaving ambiguous comments on her posts, so I don't think the reason was anything like that. She was in the habit of leaving odd comments on some of my posts that made me feel like she resents a lot of the personal progress I've been making though -- especially when it comes to things like selfies, beauty posts, or workout/health updates. This person had been on the wagon for a while herself with all of that stuff, but she started backsliding badly around the time my own progress was becoming really visible, and I think she resents that.