That is what this is, this ‘self quarantine’ – it is solitary confinement which is, after all, a punishment. A severe punishment meted out in prisons. And hey guys, I did nothing wrong, why am I being punished? Well, maybe somethings I did wrong, depending on your value system, some prudes would definitely say that I sinned. Particularly since April 2016. A prude is a person who is or claims to be easily shocked by matters relating to sex or nudity. Used in a sentence: The sex was so ambiguous and romantic that none but a prude could find it objectionable. I do so love the synonyms: prig, killjoy, moral zealot/fanatic, moralist, Mrs Grundy, Grundy, old maid, schoolmarm, pietist, Victorian, priggish person; North American bluenose; informal goody-goody, Goody Two-Shoes, holy Joe, holy Willie, Miss Prim.
So you Goody Two-Shoes, Miss Prims, Prigs and killjoys I shall point out I did not go to bed with the last three men in my life and all three of them were rich and handsome and famous. . So is this fair? Well sometimes life is not fair.
I do not know about you guys, but I am sleeping a lot. Actually, it is a normal reaction, so sayeth a New Yorker article. Studies of astronauts done over the years revealed that sleeping is a natural reaction to solitude and boredom. I write from bed using my laptop so that makes me vulnerable to nodding off. Yesterday I slept seventeen hours, waking up this morning at eight. Interesting dreams with people in them so some relief from this solitary confinement. I do laugh. For some reason thoughts upon wakening centered upon my popularity throughout my lifetime. I always had scores of friends, both male and female and, after high school and Uni, many boyfriends. Somewhere between marriage number one and two I counted; nine men in my life. Those were in the days before AIDs and sexually transmitted diseases and I obviously was not sleeping with all of them – well not at once, she said laughingly.
But obviously, all of that has changed. My popularity is proven by my blog statistics, how very strange. At the moment I email only my computer guru and CPI, a friend from high school and Uni days. I speak on the phone only to Personal Driver. It must be remembered that I live in San Francisco, thirty ,minutes from Marin County where I lived and worked from 1973 until 2014. The photograph, appended to this blog is the calendar page from June 2014 – at the time I was divorced, living alone with plans intact, going to school in London for two and a half years, stopping on the way to visit with my brother and his family near Toronto. I counted the number of people seen that month, fifty-one. It was astounding. Doing volunteer work at Laurel House, being on the board of the Marin County Association of Retirement Employees. Those meetings were not included in the head count. Most of those people are still there – thirty minutes away from my San Francisco apartment. Do I see any of them or email them? No!. I was Granny Alexis to eight grandchildren, a goggly party in my honour on June 28th, 2014, teaching Grandson Cole how to drive five times that month. Do I see any of them? Nary a one. I no longer have any contact with my brother and his family. Wise Man asked a simple question that was so comforting.
He: Do you miss them?
Me: No, actually I do not. What a great question.
What happened? Well I was gone for five years – not returning for Christmas or holidays as I was researching in Canada and Scotland. And I changed – one friend said she wanted the Old Alexis back, but I didn’t – I liked the New Alexis and the long lasting friendship dissolved. So I sit here in my solitude but laughingly say to people on my shopping excursions
Me: I love my own company. I usually cheer people up but now I just cheer myself up. It is easer that way.
They: Laughter.
At the moment I am between men – not a good time to be alone as no bars or restaurants or coffee shops or anything. The public places of this apartment building are closed. I am not following Instagram which was an enormous source of guys- I think four or five said they wanted to marry me, after fleecing me of money. They did not get an, by the way. One or two still try and stay in touch.
As any one reading this blog can attest – I have too much time on my hands. But, another way to look at the loss of those 51 people is to see that we no longer had anything in common. I left and had unique experiences that they did not share, nor possibly imagine Good times and bad times but exciting times and even if bad times I landed on my feet and became like a Phoenix Rising From The Ashes.
I spoke to Personal Driver of my manless state – telling him that I have a plan when this is all over. I plan on marrying a man of the Islamic faith, an older man closer to my age, who had a long and a happy marriage but his wife died of the coronavirus. We laughed! Oh, I forgot that sort of made a pass at a man yesterday in my blog – The Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi. Is he reading my blog? Well he might be, as I have 264 readers in the UAE and he is very close to the Sultan.
A profound thought just came to me: when you give up and ordinary life, you give up your ordinary friends. I stopped living an ordinary life in 2014 when I left for London. I did not know that at the time but knowing that now, I still would have done it and I am glad, most joyous that I did. There have been losses but there have been wondrous gains.
But time for some humour. This from the New Yorker humour section has an article Netflix Documentaries We Watched Under Quarantine. Here are a few of them, you will laugh out loud, I promise.
“Periodontal Disease Me! Morgan Spurlock’s Year Without Flossing”
“Dogs: Pretty Stupid in the Grand Scheme of Things”
“He Stayed Fat”
“Kids Winning High-School Basketball Championships But Then Failing When It Comes to Life”
“Taylor Swift: Coached Toward a Simulacrum of Candor”
“Up from Above: The Alien-Anal-Probe Aetna Insurance Conspiracy”
“Wry Brit vs. Confused Redneck: A Travelogue”
“Bratz Dolls: My Totally Bratty Obsession, by Werner Herzog”
“American Masters: The Guy Who Invented Cheese-in-the-Crust Pizza”
“District 14: The Story of a Single Congressional Race That Will Renew Your Faith in Democracy Until the Next Time You Check Twitter”
By the way, my zip code is 94102, I shall not open an envelope that does not have a return address and it is impossible to gain entry to my building and I do not answer the door if a knock is heard.
