WARNING: THE LANGUAGE IN TODAY'S BLOG IS A LITTLE SALTY. READERS UNDER THE AGE OF 14 SHOULD PROCEED ONLY WITH PARENTAL PERMISSION.
YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED.
So, with Covid and sheltering in place and wearing masks and social distancing, I do believe the impossible has happened: I've become even more weird to my fellow man and woman.
Those of you who know me, or who read this blog more than once a year know that I have a bit of a different outlook on life and that colors my interactions with those around me. I have a problem with my internal edit button, I tend to be very sarcastic, and, in my gentle, conservative, church going circle of friends I'm considered a hilarious, eccentric outlaw.
And then Covid happened and, well, stuff got a little worse.
It was bound to happen, I guess. I mean, I already work at home, so my contact with my coworkers and the general public is by phone or email. Thanks to Covid, I don't get to exercise my social chat muscle much on people like wait staff or cashiers because, between the masks and the plexiglass walls that have popped up all over the place...well...it's hard to hear anyone say anything. Plus, you know, actually eating in a restaurant is frowned upon. (Or forbidden, depending on the state in which you live.)
My biggest form of contact with people who are not in my house is at the pharmacy, which is where, I believe, my newest bout of weirdness began. See, with the masks and plexiglass, we now have to speak at louder volumes. And since it's the pharmacy, we're sharing fairly private details of ourselves...at louder volumes. As a society, we've just sort of all agreed this is okay to shout at pharmacy techs and pharmacists, regardless of how personal the information might be. We pinky swear we won't share that any info we hear in line with anyone else. Especially about that rash cream, man in front of me last week. I'm not sharing any of the stuff you shouted at the tech with anyone. Who needs those images in their head?
But here's the thing: Once you're used to shouting, and oversharing, and then not talking to people unless you're shouting or oversharing, well, something happens in your brain. At least it did in mine.
Which is how, on Tuesday at choir practice, I made a complete normal situation really, really weird.
So I'm at choir practice...something I haven't done in a while (I'd like to blame Covid for my poor attendance at choir practice, but we all know I'm not a great practice attender.) and I'm sitting in my normal spot, except hubby told me a couple weeks ago that we've gotten a new alto who was sitting in my spot because, well, I wasn't there.
And I'm sitting in my chair, chatting with the lady next to me when the new lady comes in and she's got a little kiddo with her. And next to me is an open chair, which I use for my coat and water bottle, phone purse...basically I've claimed the chair next to me as also mine because it's all about me.
So the new alto sees me in what she'd been using as her spot and she's cool, she and the little one sit in the front row and start chatting with the front row altos.
Now, a NORMAL person whose brain had not been damaged by all the Covid stuff would have just leaned over and said, "Hi, I'm Sarah, welcome to this choir, good to meet you." Or something along those lines. Not me.
So the new lady sat down in the front row with her young kiddo and instead of leaning over and introducing myself, I look at Sandreen, a woman I've known for the better part of three decades and mouthed to her "is this the new woman?"
And Sandreen says, "Yes."
And then I don't lean over, nope, I just look square at the back of the new woman's head and I say in a voice that's way too loud, "HI! I'M SARAH!"
And the lady startles, turns and says, in a completely normal adult voice, "Hi I'm......"
(I may have mentioned I'm really terrible with names. Her name might be Stacey or Stashia or Stanislaw. I will forever be calling her "new alto with kid.")
And here's where I really go off the rails. I then say, again, in a really loud voice: I KNOW YOU WERE SITTING HERE LAST TIME, AND I''M SITTING HERE NOW BUT IF YOU WANT TO SIT HERE I CAN MOVE TO THE FRONT ROW AND I CAN MOVE ALL MY STUFF AND YOU AND YOUR LITTLE ONE, HI LITTLE ONE, CAN SIT HERE IT'S NO BIG DEAL.
Now, New Alto with Kid looks at me, and she looks at Sandreen and she looks back at me and says, "no, we're fine. Right here. We're fine."
"BUT I KNOW YOU WERE...WELL OKAY. I DON'T WANT TO MAKE IT WEIRD EVEN THOUGH I'VE MADE IT WEIRD NOW! BUT WELCOME!"
Yeah...
Oh and did I mention that before this little lapse of normalcy, Sandreen's husband, a man who has sat in my front yard during this Covid stuff and enjoyed a nice socially distanced beer with hubby after a long day of work here and there the past couple months...he walked past my chair and said, "Hey, Sarah. Good to see you." And he smiled.
And I said, "Why? What do you know? What have you heard?"
And he says, "Can't I just say hello and smile?"
And I say, "I'm not sure."
Seriously, WHAT IS WRONG WITH ME?
Oh and something you should probably know about me and the deterioration that is my general self these days:
I come from a very conservative, church type upbringing. I know all the "Thou Shalts" and "Thou Shalt Nots." Back in college and even beyond that, I was considered sort of an edgy girl (yeah, I know) because I would could do fun things with words (a double entre anyone?) and I wasn't above making a blue joke here and there and peppering my language with a little salt. Even as a grown up, many of my church friends think I'm hilarious and outrageous because "I tell it like it is" and I "have a unique perspective on things."
Let me tell you. This Covid thing has unleashed some kind of beast. Well, at least in my house.
There are a couple words I do not care for. I'm not going to spell them out here, but one of them begins with an F. My kids, darling adults that they are, love to try and get either hubby or me to spew an F word now and again. (Long live the memory of the F-bomb Thanksgiving. Hubby may never live that one down.) Apparently, however, the kids don't have to work on me anymore...nope, APPARENTLY the language cloud over my head has gotten so blue that HUBBY had to ask to me to PLEASE STOP USING THAT WORD!
So there's that!
And, I also realized this fun fact this week: Remember "That 70's Show?" Sure, we all do. Well, I know I was never cool enough to be one of the kids. Not even Fez, poor dear Fez. But I knew, I KNEW I was definitely one of the parents. You bet. I was Kitty Foreman. The fun loving, cookie baking, wine drinking, lard laughing mom who just wanted everyone to be happy and peaceful.
Turns out, Thanks to Covid, I'm not Kitty anymore.
Nope. I'm officially Red Foreman.
Why?
Because the words DUMB and ASS come out of my mouth, oh, I don't know, like 700 times a day.
What I'm saying is that Covid affects us all in different ways. Me, I used to be a funny Sunday School teacher who could get kids interested in reading the Bible by teaching the lessons from the "SPICIER" stories in there. Now, I'm a loud mouthed weirdo who yells at unsuspecting altos, calls everyone a dumb ass, and makes her husband uncomfortable with her potty mouth.
I want to be loving, patient, funny Kitty Foreman again. I want to love my fellow man and woman and find funny pictures of baby goats and not sit there and listen to this person bark about wearing masks and that person barking about not wearing masks and everything on TV talking about Covid (Seriously, "Grey's Anatomy?" You think people want to see your season premier mid November after everything else we've slogged through with Covid and terrible weather all over and murder hornets and the election ...you think we want an entire storyline dedicated to more COVID? REALLY? Where are the explosions and the brain transplants and the many, many, many, many love scenes in the on call room? Where's all that?)
I really want to be happy and loving and joyful enjoy TV shows that aren't "The Great British Baking Show."
Hmmmm, maybe I am Kitty after all!
Have a super weekend all, and hey, since I probably won't be blogging much since November is National Novel Writing Month and I've actually taken a week off my day job next week to try and finish the first draft of my new novel: DEAL WITH A DEVIL for those of you in the US, happy Thanksgiving, and for the rest of us, Happy Holidays, let's finish strong with peace and hope for better times.
And I know some of you evil people out there are really, really hoping I stay this awkward. Yeah, I know you are...you mean dumb asses! LOL
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