Human Connection

 My friends are all dying around me in different ways and it's reached that point again where I find myself withdrawing from them, going through the motions that I care when I'm questioning if I do. One has a brain disease and multiple health issues that are killing them slowly, the other gets suicidal and depressed whenever their partner isn't with them constantly and another is drinking and smoking their way through trying to cope with lockdown and relationship issues as well as not having the opportunity to use their intelligence in a positive way.

Lockdown's made us all lazy, crazy but also angry and scared. 

I'm not afraid of death personally but for the people I care about it's very difficult for me to accept, even while knowing that a part of us all is dying everyday and that death is a natural part of life. 

My ways of dealing with my first friend are to read a book together from our homes as a sort of mini book club. I use the calls and texts every other day to make sure they are taking their medication and not drinking themselves into an earlier grave. 

The second I just send virtual hugs to every other week. They've got their partner to take care of them.

The third is probably the hardest for me to accept my own distancing from (communication wise) because I've become very close with them, (and they've warned me to get out more and meet others when lockdowns over). We share an understanding that is beyond words and I've watched others take them for a fool, while they've been under pressure to make ends meet and now this second lockdown just seems to have extinguished the spark right out of them. I can't make them see that they're not the only ones struggling, that their plans aren't the only ones getting disrupted.

I don't give advice to them, since I'm still figuring out my own life, but I wish I could say it hurts for me to care about them but it doesn't. I feel like a scientist observing an experiment in human connection that's teaching me more than I expected it to.  I'm listening with my ears and saving my heart for the people who keep me going.