11.30 | Permission to feel déjà vu: When will we stop getting Covid?
Hi, it's me. Sorry for dropping off the face of the earth. I've missed you. Here are a few words I typed while recovering from Covid...again.
November is a weird month. The year feels stale, but we still have a few weeks before its expiration date.
I tend to struggle at this time of year. I start reflecting on the last ten-ish months and quickly fixate on everything I didn’t do, the goals I felt short of achieving. (Daylight savings probably doesn’t help.)
The number of weeks remaining in the calendar year can be counted on one hand, which feels like too little time to do anything else of importance. So, I may as well rot on the couch until New Year’s.
Anyone else?
This year is no different. Except today, I’m becoming one with said couch because I’ve caught Covid. Again.
The last time I had Covid, I was striding onstage to accept my Pulitzer Traveling Fellowship at Columbia in May 2022, which I wrote about here. Now, over a year later, I’ve tested positive as my time overseas for said fellowship is coming to a close.
The pandemic itself is a sort of time marker, Gen Z’s version of “where were you on 9/11?” So it figures that my two brushes with Covid are bookending this chapter of my life. Once again, I’m left congested, achy, and overthinking.
In the spirit of revisiting the past, I started reflecting on my graduate school thesis. After graduation last spring, I pitched the story, but never found a place to get it published, partly due to my fear of rejection (I told you this was a theme!!) I’m proud of it, though, and it deserves to be seen. It’s an inspiring story that will make you fall in love with New York City (at least, a very special corner of it!)
So I’m polishing it up, and plan to post the piece here, on Permission Slips, early next week. Stay tuned!
After I share that, I promise I’ll start writing in the present tense again and provide a few updates on my fellowship work, and what comes next. Spoiler alert: I still don’t know!
Stay healthy out there.
Love,
Chloe
Feel better soon!