Full disclosure: I'm agoraphobic.

I haven't always been this way, of course. But consistent health issues and the ever-looming threat of disease reinfection have rendered me a terrified little lamb with a distinct aversion to crowds & open spaces. Few people are welcome in my home at all, and the sheer thought of stepping into the outside world makes my blood run ice cold.

Pre-COVID I was still fantastically ill. But my only limitations were my own body, my chronic pain, and my energy levels. There was no ongoing threat to my already diminishing quality of life. No coughing barista ready to execute me, no well-meaning stranger on the sidewalk stepping into my bubble to ask (too close) about my SLR camera. There were no judging glances, no death stares, no respirators.

Life has changed a lot for people like me. I've been incredibly blessed to have a supportive and compassionate spouse. He is the only one who truly sees and respects my boundaries and needs.

Yesterday he packed our car and drove off, border-bound, to see to his ailing mother's bedside. I'd have given anything to go - to be by his side as he held her hand and she recounted stories of her youth in Guangzhou through rattled breathing, for him to translate these stories for me and to share in his family's pilgrammage to the NY Presbytarian Hospital.

Instead I'm here, alone, stress-eating half a loaf of sourdough bread between updates from him. Praying for the best, expecting the worst. How has she been waiting on an MRI for 48 hours?

Our apartment is scary without him. It's a stupid problem to have, but it's too big and I'm scared. It's too vast, cold, and dark. There are too many empty rooms. At night when I get up to pee, walking through the hall in a sleepy stupor, it takes me ages. Every trip from the kitchen to my office is a perilous adventure.

With your absence you have sucked the home out of this place.