Notes from my Knapsack 4-16-20

Notes from my Knapsack 4-16-20

Jeff Gill

 

Fool myself twice, no thank you

___

 

Cynicism is not, truly, my default mode.

 

But I can still recall the column I wrote in late September of 2001, and how I was certain that after the events of 9-11, everything . . . or at least much would change.

 

So certain.

 

Now, there were things that did change. Airline travel, for instance (oh my). Metal detectors, already going up everywhere, got to everywhere even more quickly. Security culture in many ways ratcheted up for both businesses and household life.

 

But there was a spirit of community and coming together that, for a moment, seemed lasting. The first anniversary of what became "Patriot Day" was a widely participated-in communal work project day (in Hebron, we painted fire hydrants and pedestrian bridges all over town), but it faded quickly.

 

And we can rehearse wearily the debates over the how and why of invading first Afghanistan, and then Iraq, but even before the final decision to go in was made, the political unity was already well eroded. The Patriot Act left behind forms and civil liberty disputes and divisions in its wake (I still don't understand a form asking me "are you a terrorist?"), then of course the war which now looks even more of a piece of many previous American foreign policy stumbles.

 

In other words, very little changed for the good, anyhow, after 9-11. I can sift my memories for particular, personal bright spots, flecks of gold in the mounds of gravel, but it's mostly grey and more of the same.

 

Which nearly two decades later has me very hesitant to proclaim "the Great Hiatus will change us all, for the better!" Odds are excellent that by the time you read this, we will still be under a "stay-at-home" order from the governor and director of the state health department, and Ohio will still be asking people coming into the state from elsewhere to self-quarantine for fourteen days. The end of the orders, if not the restrictions, is set for May 1; if we see the far side of the peak in deaths and hospital resource use before then, we're all too likely to be asked to maintain some level of caution and care and social distancing into the month of May, a kind of multi-stage relaxation of interaction and association.

 

But I'm not talking about those restrictions not changing. They will, even if more slowly than some business owners understandably would like. As Dr. Fauci has said, "getting back to normal won't be just like flipping a switch."

 

What I fear won't change is that most of us will slide right back into our previous patterns and preferences and assumptions. I'd love to say (again) that this difficult period which has brought us "#AloneTogether" will teach us lasting lessons about the value of family, the joys of cooking at home, and the importance of working together as a community.

 

Except with or without a "Great Hiatus" I don't think any of those changes take place without mindful, intentional work, even if we are forced for months, let alone weeks, into the form of such a change. We can spring back out of such a form all too easily.

 

If there's anything we've found to be of value during this long Lent, our extended time-out, it will require us to put some time and attention to preserving them once we get to whatever our new normal will be. Very little other than eating and sleeping comes automatically to us human creatures, and sometimes not even that.

 

 

Jeff Gill is a writer, storyteller, and pastor in Licking County; he's not sure how long his coffee supply will hold out, but he has plenty of filters. Tell him how the confinement is going for you at knapsack77@gmail.com, or follow @Knapsack on Twitter.