Crossing the Chasm

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“Beautiful days do not come to you, you must walk towards them.” – Rumi

Yesterday was the first day that my daughter could be in school without a mask on. I found it to be a trepidatious experience. As a single, working parent, one of my biggest concerns is for school to be able to continue in-person. If I had to send my child in a full haz-mat suit, I would happily comply.

But broader than that, now that our state mask mandate has ended, is the question of whether I would continue to wear a mask when going into a store or resume activities like an in-person meditation class now that we seem to be transitioning to endemic mode from pandemic mode.

I’m not an epidemiologist so I don’t have an authoritative answer on mask wearing so I’m happy to follow their advice. But some of this return to normalcy feels like taking a big step to cross over the chasm.

Crossing over the chasm makes me think of some of the scariest things I’ve had to jump over or traverse when I was climbing mountains – like crevasses on Mt. Rainier. In most cases, I was lucky enough to have traversed them the first time going up the mountain in the dark. That way I couldn’t see the pit we were walking over on horizontal ladders with some plywood on them while wearing crampons our on boots which made the balance on top of metal spikes feel even more precarious. (See featured photo of my friend preparing to do this).

When I saw the full scale of what we had to do to cross back over in the light of day, that ladder was between me and the parking lot. That I had something to get back to was big motivation to conquer the fear and discomfort of crossing over.

Looking for the lure to other side of going back to pre-COVID practices and it reminds me of a Ten Percent Happier podcast that I heard with Professor Barbara Frederickson about positivity resonance. Our bodies and minds benefit greatly every time we experience a positive emotion in concert with another human. It could be as simple as a smile exchanged at the grocery store or being interested in the same topic with another person.

The more of these positive resonance interactions we have, the more we are buoyed by them and the benefits extend to our creativity, openness, willingness to get out of bed in the morning and on and on. Her two caveats for these to be possible – we have to feel safe and we have to be face-to-face. (She did say we can get somewhat of a boost on screen or over the phone but it’s harder).

There is a boy in my daughter’s class that she is particularly fond of. In Kindergarten, he was one of the two and a half boyfriends she’d told everyone about. (The half boyfriend talked too much to be a full one). Miss O was so excited yesterday to go to school to see his face which she has only really seen fully at his birthday party without a mask on. That in and of itself helped me get over my fear of this new phase of our public school lives.

May we all reap the benefits of more positive resonance.

22 thoughts on “Crossing the Chasm”

  2. “Our bodies and minds benefit greatly every time we experience a positive emotion in concert with another human. It could be as simple as a smile exchanged at the grocery store or being interested in the same topic with another person.” . . . insightful, words Wynne.

    I may not be as adept as I once was in traversing mountain chasms, but your reminder I can steal reap ” …a positive emotion in concert with another human… ” with something that requires much less physical prowess such as “… a simple as a smile exchanged …” is encouraging. Thank you.

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    1. I love this comment, Fred! I imagine you are great at establishing positive resonance! And I bet you are probably still pretty good at those mountaineering obstacles as well. Wisdom seems to do most of the work to get us across. 😉

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  3. This is a time of trepidation for many. Traversing a mountain takes a healthy dose of risk-taking and fear, I would imagine. Going unmasked during an airborne pandemic is something altogether different. Personally, I’m not reassured. Hope it goes well for you and your daughter. My eldest is also a single Mom and we’re feeling the same angst.

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    1. Thanks for the good wishes. Angst is a good word, VJ. Seattle Public Schools has done a good job managing this for the last couple of years so that provides me some reassurance. And as Prof Frederickson said about positive resonance, you have to feel safe to be able to establish it (she was talking broadly about psychological safety) so I’m grateful the schools have worked hard to make sure everyone is comfortable whatever their choice of mask is and hope they’ll continue to do so. Sending my good wishes to you and your family as we traverse this!

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  4. My thoughts on this go up and down, although not as deeply as that chasm. There is no right or wrong way to go about the new normal. What I find perplexing/disturbing/sad/? is the push to remind everyone, including kids/schools that it’s still okay to wear a mask if you choose- but that others must be kind to those who do. News story yesterday about the teacher who had 1 student in class still wearing a mask and she chose to wear hers so the child would not feel odd, sad, or the focus of questions. Great teacher, but choice should never be a news story and no one should ever have to be reminded to allow others to freely decide how they proceed in this process because there is fear and retribution lurking behind individual choice.

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    1. What an interesting point, Deb. Yes, the schools did a powerpoint for each classroom reminding them to honor each other’s choices. For us, we have a neighbor who is immuno-compromised so we’ve spent a lot of time talking about every family having a different levels of need for safety. It’d be great if we didn’t have to remind people to be kind but I’m okay with SPS underscoring the message because kids sometimes forget to appreciate different experiences!

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  5. There are so many facing these same sorts of apprehensions/anxieties surrounding the return to mask-less encounters with others. I hope that you, and your daughter, are able to navigate your path in a way that feels safe to you both. Thank you for articulating your experience around this! I think this discussion helps to normalize these feelings in others ❤

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    1. What an insightful comment. Grace. Normalizing our feelings is a great way to put as we face the path we are all traversing as we pick our way through it! Thank you for reading and commenting!

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  6. Going back to a maskless world is very scary indeed and I can understand your trepidation. We will be faced with this next Monday when mask mandates lift just as kids return to school from Spring Break.

    I’m glad your daughter was able to find a positive resonance!

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  7. If I’d climbed Mount Rainier in the dark, I might have never bothered wearing a mask in the first place! (I kid. But I think you and your kids will be just fine. Take it like you did with that chasm: one step at a time.)

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    1. OMG – this comment completely surprised and cracked me up! There are many advantages to climbing Mt Rainier in the dark – so you don’t see the stuff that could fall on your head but probably won’t because it’s frozen to the mountain until the sun comes up. 🙂 🙂 🙂

      Great comment – one step at a time. You are absolutely right and thanks for the vote of confidence!

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