Six Feet Apart

Standing six feet apart didn’t kill neighborly intimacy. It actually transformed those who were once strangers into new acquaintances and friends, who were then six feet closer. Pandemically, that six feet could also reveal the interpersonal gulfs, thus creating an opportunity to edit out the toxic relationships, protecting us both physically from a virus, and mentally from those who aren’t healthy to be around. Also, dogs!

Between March 24th and April 18th I walked the hills of Los Angeles, armed with a 99cent store lime green tape measure and my mobile phone. With some, it felt safe and easy to maintain the 6 feet distance. Others, there was temptation to step closer. One, who was angered by the culture of caution around the virus deliberately and performatively coughed on me to demonstrate that I wouldn’t get sick. (I was anxious for two long weeks after that happened.)

Early pandemic was an unparalleled, unique time of evolving facts and information. The end of the world as we once knew it. An opportunity to slow down, breathe cleaner air, admire a bluer sky, greener grass, witness more wildlife, less traffic, and meet neighbors we’d never before laid eyes on. Of course what we know today is so different than what we felt and worried about then. We are so fortunate, those of us who are here and healthy to be on this side of survival. As one of my friends and I kept reminding one another, when we were beating ourselves up about being unproductive, uncertain and not using all this time to be more creative — we had one job and that job was not to die.
— Shira Levine