Passing time during a pandemic

It is odd being caught with such an arsenal of days, these little, quiet, quick-flowing things. When boredom becomes something mandatory - the lack of available work doing its thing - it becomes so necessary to improvise entertainment.

For me, the last few months have primarily been spent doing one of three things in my absurd amounts of free time: one, spending more time than I ever have with family. Two, spending more time than I ever have browsing the aisles of used bookstores. Three, spending ​far​ too much time on the Internet.

I've made a great effort in keeping myself out of the house, a place where I began to feel less relaxed and more liked a caged bird when the pandemic began. It seems the rest of the world has had things to do but me, so I've been happy to spend that time out helping my family - helping my sister move, helping to watch her children, helping my brothers around their new farmhouse, and especially helping my aunt and uncle refloor their basement (a task which took many weekends from many months, and which they were kind enough to insist on paying me for).

Being helpful has been a strange thing, too. I've become acclimated to doing it less out of boredom and more out of the fact that I care about these people more than I'll try putting into words.

The other considerable amount of my time has been spent mostly on the Internet, discovering a love for Hogan's Heroes as well as stumbling through an absolute wasteland of job opportunities. Thankfully, I've got good work to look forward to at the start of this new year, so I'll be plenty more occupied with that than YouTube and video games.

I'm most productive at night, when I'm dead tired, so around midnight I've picked up the habit of journaling the day's events and reading something historical - the Civil War is my most recent infatuation. If I'm in a particular mood I'll make something up, writing my own thing for a while, before finally crashing until the next morning. If I don't already have something planned for the next day, something surely comes knocking, and another day I haven't earned becomes a day well spent.

The most important lesson of the pandemic I've received is appreciation for the time I have. Days are little, quiet things, flowing quickly by, and the struggle to find new work has been a heavy process which emphasizes that shortness. Time is limited. Dollars are limited. Bills require both, and are unlimited. It pays well to be helpful and to learn. Goodness knows we've all done a lot of learning this year.