Many, many years ago, I lived through a similar situation. We were in the Sahara doing military service at 18 years old in a magical place that at that time was called Villa Cisneros. People lived with all their avatars in a serene and dignified way.
Then the corona virus arrived and destroyed everything. Armies and civilians? all, from whatever side, paid the "trust" in the corona virus. We ended up in a state of siege and now I remember patrolling those streets so similar in some way to Caleta del Sebo. Empty, deserted, over the desert.
The consequences of that corona virus for those people (Saharawis) was catastrophic and even today they are still paying for it. In fact, the people have not been able to return to their homes, the illusion of their lives.
What a paradox this new corona virus is (which appears when that one, showing its damn entrails, is almost extinct). This one "punishes" us by going to our homes. That one continues to reproduce and the vaccine has not yet appeared, for social democracy, the center and the right. Its carriers. So I think that when we leave our homes, the first thing we should do is return theirs to those people. It is only crowns that prevent it; crowns, not viruses.
Then I had another similar experience and also with a virus and also confined at home. That time it was with hepatitis C and it was 6 miserable months confined to the sofa, I couldn't do more. I couldn't read or watch TV or anything at all. I built time, the time on the clock between the spaces that go from meal to meal because fortunately it didn't break my appetite. And one day was extremely long.
In this case it wasn't the crown that came, but I can assure you that I was fed up. So I have experience in this matter, age is a degree. If you have lived it.
As I say, I got into all the stories that came my way, most of which led me to spend large doses of fear, I have experienced fears of all types and colors, physical, emotional, intellectual and spiritual fears. I have spent them without saving the slightest bit ever, without foreseeing that I would need them for the future and now, suddenly, I see that I have nothing left for the rest of my life and I swear that it is the most serene experience I could imagine. Having spent the fear.
So with my heart in one hand, my head in the other and my guts in their place, I almost dare to advise you to spend the fear, that every time something scares you, go through it, consume it, face it. Because if you don't consume it when you are young, when you are old it can be catastrophic and it, consume you. I can't confirm that last thing but I sense it, not to say that I see it.
And one last thing: one's fear is not spent by making others go through it. Quite the opposite. That's how it grows. This is a very fine balance. Perhaps that is where the art of life lies. The art of loving.
A tip, a game. For the cloister. Get up at dawn even at night, at dawn. Sit comfortably somewhere in the house where light can enter. I'm not talking about looking out to see the sunrise, I'm talking about seeing how the light enters the house and thinking as if your mind were a brush with which from your place you are giving light to everything.
Observe even the smallest detail. Now a brick is illuminated, now the cat's tail, the wall, a vase, the cracks in doors and windows, the curtains, oooh the curtains!, the universe of suspended dust? Whatever. Do not value the objects, the shapes, only the light on them, the reflections, the shadows. And if you manage to do it well you will discover that you are in the most fantastic place in the world. I know that then the world gets complicated; that's not what it's about.
I am tremendously happy that my mother is no longer here spending this horrible time for them. Very happy. And very aware of those who are still here and what they are living. But even so, I still miss when after a terrible night, the light entered the living room in the morning and little by little bathed it. Then her face was ecstatic. And she slept deeply. And the light reached its maximum splendor. I know that the light comes from the sun and that the sun does not need conspiracies of any kind to fry or freeze us when it feels like it.
And I know more things. About light and time. And consequently about darkness and space. And about the emptiness that encompasses everything.
Postscript: For the youngest, the corona virus was the king, the Sahara was Spain and he, because of his corona virus affairs, did not decolonize that territory giving those Spaniards freedom, but handed them over to another crown. The one of Morocco. Many of those Spaniards had to flee to Algeria, mainly, and there they have lived confined for more than 40 years in very harsh conditions waiting to return to their homes. Those that now, to many of us, become heavy.
