Tiny World
Once upon a time, I lived a big life. I traveled. A lot. I went to faraway places on my own or with a friend. We would split up, and I would wander the streets in foreign cities by myself. I would learn enough of the language to get by. I had great adventures.
Josh and I were only together a few months when we hit the road to drive to the Maritimes in Canada with only a loose plan of where we would go and what we would do. We purchased spur-of-the-moment tickets to Paris, saw theater in London, and drove to beach to beach to beach. We thought nothing of hopping in the car and driving many hours to see my siblings.
And once the twins were here, we involved them in the adventures, too. They have already had two passports, and they’ll renew for their third before they go to college because they’re game to go anywhere and everywhere. The ChickieNob organizes us, creating Google forms so the family can vote on the next place we go. The Wolvog takes 360 videos so we can watch them in VR once we’re home and feel like we’re still somewhere else.
We don’t really spend money on anything else. It’s just books and travel.
And then COVID-19 stopped travel. So now it’s just books.
My world has become so tiny.
It is partially tiny due to logistics. We can’t cross borders right now, and the places we’d go have their countries in lockdown. And it is partially tiny by choice. Or… choice doesn’t feel like the right word. It is tiny because it is overwhelming to be out-and-about right now.
Planes feel off-limits, and where would we even go? We’re not entering buildings or homes. Traveling on the highway feels overwhelming. The cars are moving so quickly, and it all feels too bright and too loud. We thought we’d go to the beach off-season this fall—it’s generally empty by the end of September. But it feels… too much. Just driving to the beach and reading on the sand feels like a Herculean task. So I’m staying home and reading with my pig.
That’s what I feel like I can do right now: Read with my pig.
See, everything is tiny.
10 comments
Tiny sounds awfully cute.
Tiny, perhaps. But given the pig in question, definitely glorious!
I have never traveled much because I have never had the money (when I was younger) or the time (since I’ve had the money). Nevertheless, I have always very much enjoyed and looked forward to the trips I *did* get to take, so I can’t imagine how hard this situation must be for folks like you who actually did travel frequently in The Before Times.
We will get back to those times, but in the interim, it’s tough.
Oh dear. Tiny could (perhaps) be happy, but with the exception of the pig, doesn’t sounds happy (to me) as described here. Assuming that’s accurate, I’m sorry. I hope we’ll all be able to return to bigger-than-tiny before too much of this decade has elapsed.
Like you, I miss travel, but (a) we have a camping trailer and have been finding that works reasonably well as a mode of travel during the pandemic — in many ways, very well, but time remains an issue, and twice the weather has intervened (it being 2020 and all) to make travel — feasible but a lot less fun. I am also finding some joy in discovering (outdoor, unpopulated) things near my home that I might not have explored/discovered had my world not gotten so much smaller.
I know, everything seems so different now..
Makes for a nice change. :/
(Not really.)
I like your tiny world. Reading with your pig at home sounds like an endurable way to spend the pandemic. It sucks we can’t go anywhere. It sucks that a lot of people are going places anyway. I hate this. But I like reading your blog and I’m happy you’re reading with your pig.
It does feel like COVID has shrunk our worlds! Wanted to share this link, as I thought of you and your pig 🙂 https://www.nordstrom.com/s/mini-boden-print-leggings-baby/5797404?utm_campaign=low_nd_social_2020fy_nordstrom_2836_j009167_3657_ret-daba_bidtoconversion_sku&utm_content=6202865207299_low_nd_social_ret_2020fy_persistent_daba-bidtoconversion_consolidated_broad_j009167_3657_dpa_sku_test_bopus&utm_medium=cpm&utm_source=facebook&utm_term=6202865206899_low_nd_social_ret_2020fy_nordstrom_fb_2836_persistent_daba-bidtoconversion_consolidated_broad_j009167-3657_dpa_sku_test_bopus&utm_channel=low_nd_social_ret&sp_source=facebook&sp_campaign=low_nd_social_2020fy_nordstrom_2836_j009167_3657_ret-daba_bidtoconversion_sku&fbclid=IwAR2iV1h0DacecjqWphMhjurJetH8gULtcb09QGmEgyZGolML95MwGzwMN2E
It’s definitely a time of contraction. What amazing creatures you are surrounded by during this time!
I do believe expansion will come again. There are always cycles. I don’t know when it will happen or what it will look like, but this contraction will not stay forever. Things will get big again, and for now we ride it out. A different kind of adventure, on a smaller scale.
I so miss travel, too. Sigh…those were the days.
Reading with your pig is a lovely kind of tiny, but I hear you. Everything feels so overwhelming and anyplace that involves a) going indoors/inside, b) eating inside, c) having to use a public restroom, or d) being around lots of people I don’t know for extended periods of time is awful sounding. So no road trips. Although everything I just describes also describes school, and I do that 4 days/week but it’s exhausting. Andre not so much a vacation.
Books and puzzles and food, that’s where my money is going. I could stand for my world to be a bit tinier.