So what can I say about Covid that I haven’t said over the last year, quite a bit apparently. So let’s begin…
Before Covid I was a relatively carefree man living life in Phoenix, Arizona. My day job is in a very resilient
industry that I’ve worked in for over a decade including during the Great Recession. I spent my weekends seeking out adventure and travel. When I wasn’t traveling, I spent my weekends eating and drinking my way through the various restaurants in the Valley of the Sun. The Year 2020 started out great with my second Caribbean cruise and I had plans to make it my greatest travel year yet. But then Covid started hitting the news in the United States and things started to slow down.
Social distancing mandates, stay at home orders, and international travel bans were established, but I was still going to work each day. My day job’s industry is highly contingent on large gatherings of people, so I often thought of what happens if I catch Covid. So after working a few weeks into the pandemic, the unexpected happened and my day job closed for two weeks in an attempted to flatten the curve. I remember leaving from work that day and stopping at the grocery store to stock up on supplies. It was early in the morning but I could see the effects of panic buying as the store shelves started emptying out. I got my essentials and headed home, not quite sure what would happen next. So all of a sudden I was sitting at home with nothing to do, but think about how the world was changing and how I will fit into its new form.
So I was very fortunate that during the two week closure of my day job I would continue to be paid by my employer. Even though I had prepared a rainy day fund for dark times, still being paid helped alleviate some stress. But being left alone with my own thoughts filled that stress void quickly. Since I didn’t have to go to work and I couldn’t go do any activities, things became a bit unstructured. Without structure things got weird. It seemed like I would fall asleep anytime I was bored. I was binge watching Netflix for hours on end like it was my new job. As days passed I started to lose track of what day of week it was. With no work on the horizon, beers and cocktails were acceptable with breakfast and any other meal. Meals were prepared or ordered whenever my stomach felt even slightly empty or maybe I was just bored. It felt like I was cleaning my kitchen every four hours. Outside of my home and across the world Covid news only continued to grow sadder as the two week closure was coming to a conclusion, but then the closure got extended another two weeks, once again with pay. For most people this would zap their stress away, but I always look at the big picture. What if the closure extends even further, even the most prosperous companies can’t keep paying employees without having revenue flowing in. So with more time off in the future, I had to establish a little bit of structure back into my life. I put myself on a normal sleep schedule, limited meals to three a day, and kept cocktail time to the evenings only. This helped limit my stress levels for a bit, but there were still some doomsday thoughts bouncing around in my head.
A couple more closure extensions, but then my day job reopened. It had been closed for almost two months and I was fortunate not to miss a single paycheck. Reopening hit a few bumps along the way including a second closure 40 days later that lasted two weeks, but besides that business was back to usual. But just before reopening, came the announcement that all returning employees would be Covid tested for the safety of all. A nasal swabbing is not a pleasant situation, but slowly becomes routine when it’s done every two weeks for months on end.
Summer seemed like the worst was behind us. But I was still apprehensive about things going truly back to normal. I made a couple trips to visit family and friends, but they were isolated meetings that only required a car ride. Plus with my work’s mandated biweekly Covid testing, I was always aware of my status. Even with those glimmer of hope, I stayed in my lockdown mentality staying away from restaurants and gatherings even as things started to open up in Arizona.
With work in full swing, I got the social interaction I needed and my brain had some time off from its paranoid thoughts. But as summer started to end, Covid news started to pick up just as many had predicted. At this point i was simply going to work and then coming home five days a week. My weekends once a paradise of adventure were no relegated to a time for a trip to the grocery store and two days of sitting at home. With the grim reality of a brutal winter of Covid news coming in the proceeding months, I made some changes to my life.
I had saved money for a rainy day and for an emergency or two, but Covid pushed me passed just having enough money for a month or two. So now I had a new goal to prepare for the future. With my free time I decided to go over my budget and see what is really essential in my life. I live within my means by far, but they are some excesses that I splurge on. I won’t go into a ton of detail here, I’ll save that for my “Budgeting” post coming soon. One of the largest reoccurring expenses I saw on my deep dive into my spending report was food i.e. fast food and takeout. With the pandemic I had already stopped going for sit down meals at restaurants, but fast food and takeout had filled that void. After putting a number to my expenditures, I decided to cut that spending entirely. It took some time to adjust to preparing every meal at home, but after two weeks it simply became routine. I know that the restaurant and bar industries are hurting due to Covid, but I have to look out for my own financial future. It’s now been 6 months without fast food and takeout and I must say the savings are breathtaking. Once travel opens up, I will enjoy eating at a restaurant or two, but I’ll only do it while traveling or on a special occasions. With that big change and a few others, work and grocery stores were my only ventures into the outside world. This made me feel even more cooped up, so with Arizona winter coming I decided to get out away from most people and do some camping.
So my friend invited me to join him out on the Kofa Refuge for camping. I enjoyed that camping trip very much, plus I got to take the Xterra out on the dirt roads. But after the trip, it was back to reality and my bunker type situation. In December, I made it out on the road to do some scouting for some campsites. It felt great to get some fresh air and sunshine. I then planned a solo camping trip for January, but when the day arrived so did the rain. So another of my trips was rained out. Not to go on too much of a tangent, but for a guy that lives in the desert in one of the sunniest places in the world I always have a 75% chance of an activity being rained out. So here comes February and I reschedule my camping trip, but this time something feels different. I’m a man of routine and habit, when I’m adventuring every weekend I have to force myself to take a weekend off to relax and rest up. On the opposite side, when I got into a routine of relaxing and not doing anything on the weekend, I have to force myself to go do something. So there I was trying to convince myself to stay at home even though I wanted to go out. That’s when I realized that I had embraced the lockdown mentality, but this had to end all be it in a safe way. So I forced myself to go camping that day and I absolutely loved it. It was incredible mid 70’s weather and the sunshine felt some warm and embracing.
With the vaccine rollout accelerating after initial hiccups and myself receiving my first dose of the Monderna vaccine in mid February, I’m starting to embrace the outside world more. So since that moment of realization, I walk to the park most days after work for a lap or two. I might look a bit paranoid walking at the park with a mask on, but better safe than sorry. After a couple weeks of simple walks at the park, I could feel improvements in my energy levels and general mood. It’s amazing how a little exercise, fresh air, and sunshine can make such a big difference. With my second vaccine dose coming today, I’m looking in a cautious, but optimistic way towards the future and what it holds. So be prepared to hear a lot more from me here on Maybe A Weekend!
