Ephemerality

Summer of 2022 is probably one of the hardest seasons in my life to let go of.

After 2 years of isolating, COVID winters, I remember feeling the desperate need to cling to the summer as much as possible. For me this meant maximizing the amount of time spent outdoors in the sun even if it meant foregoing something more fun indoors.

I guess my COVID PTSD is that I now have this deep seated fear that once what was a given (a normal life without lockdowns and restrictions) can be taken away within an instant.

I, just like many others, went from a life that started and ended with a ton of social stimulation. For me this meant starting my days from a place where even when I didn’t want to, all 5 senses would be engaged by the lovely sights, touches, and smells of the NYC subway. It would end with a similar rush back from a diverse yoga class.

In what felt like a blink of an eye, that dynamicity of life was snatched away. In no other season, did this lack of normalcy and the brunt of the absolute mundane, hit me more than winters — when the evil disease would rear its ugly head to remind me that it was here, well, and alive. The past two winters, the days felt longer and colder when stuck in isolation and living in constant fear.

So when the sunny days returned, it meant that it was time for me to make the most of the season.

But it’s as if the sunlight was too painful for someone accustomed to darkness because at some point in this season, the fear that this was…