The Coronavirus Diaries: The Stress Corrodes

Another sculpture along the lakefront near Saint-Sulpice, Switzerland. March 27, 2020.

This is the third entry in a diary I’ve posted weekly to document happenings, thoughts, and impressions during the coronavirus crisis.

To begin from the beginning, click here. (To review all entries in the coronavirus diaries, you can do so via this link.)

Monday, March 23, 2020

Alternate-reality new normal: The United States again announces plans for massive economic financial aid Sunday night, hoping to keep the bottom in the market Monday morning. This aid comes in the form of the Federal Reserve’s promises to buy back as much government-backed debt as needed.

These aid programs seem like misguided attempts to use old methods to solve a new problem. Further, it feels like the financial system’s panic only panics everyone else even more, provoking the opposite market effect than desired.

What do I know, though?

Despite the stimulus announcement, the markets in the United States decline again today by a bit, but not catastrophically more than they have in recent days.

We’ve boiled over with stress here at home. Small comments have flared wildfires. I call another day of solo time—which makes sense, anyway, given the workday at hand.

I make a grocery run at the end of the day. At entry, I receive a numbered card to hold until checkout. I don’t understand why. On my return walk, I pass other groceries with lines of people waiting outside for their turns to enter.

My cousin and I talk via Skype in the evening, which raises my spirits. I’d talked with my mother briefly in the midday as well, also via Skype. The video helps.

Arnaud goes onto the balcony to clap at 9 p.m. I don’t.

I read that Lausanne turned off most crosswalk buttons, preventing people from touching buttons to cross streets. I better understand all the blinking-yellow intersections I saw on my walk to and from the grocery store.

Tuesday, March 24, 2020

I put in my last pair of contacts. Though each pair should last a month, I prefer having a pair in reserve. All stores for glasses and contacts in Lausanne have closed under the quarantine. I fear untold weeks in my glasses.

I take a walk for lunch today. The world feels uncannily quiet.

Harris County, the main county in Houston, transmits a stay-at-home order starting at midnight tonight. The FrogDog team member in the process of buying a house worries that this will change her closing date.

I have a slightly contentious call with a business contact, who argues that stay-at-home orders damage the country more than the coronavirus threat. I politely but firmly disagree with him. The call is short.

I notice many more people join work calls with video, rather than defaulting to the dial-in access number. I hope this trend continues. Seeing someone during conversation, especially in his or her natural habitat, makes the exchange much more authentic and genuine.

FrogDog sends out an e-mail announcement about the crisis resource center and the seminars we’ve planned. We send the e-mail in my name. I receive several personal responses from people struggling, including a friend with a small business who just laid off all seventy employees.

Markets worldwide have risen by the closing bells. I’ve tired of even speculating about why.

Wednesday, March 25, 2020

Overnight, the United States has announced a deal for a $2 trillion economic stimulus package. They say they’ll likely need more funds than this.

I find an on-line vender for contact lenses in Switzerland and place an order. I’ll buy in the shop the next time. (In short: This is a desperate measure that will not translate into a new buying habit. I prefer buying in stores.)

Markets overseas start up and then go back down by the end of the day. The U.S. markets bounce around throughout the day, turning upward at day’s end.

I took my walk in the morning, ahead of my French class. I’ve found a better mood today. Emotions of frustration yesterday have ceded to glimmers of hope and positivity.

A friend tells me this is a heron out in the sunshine near the lake on my daily walk. I think the birds have loved this time of reduced traffic, pollution, and noise—and right in the bloom of spring, too. Vidy, Switzerland. March 27, 2020.

At midday, a friend calls and we share a truly genuine conversation about our states of mind and how we’ve coped with the stress so far. I value his direct and honest questions. Good friends and real talk matter.

How the first FrogDog seminar goes: We have a decent number of attendees for something announced at the last minute amid a lot of chaos. We don’t get much interaction, yet I receive positive feedback afterward from my teammate and a couple of attendees.

We have four seminars planned. Onward to planning the one for next week.

My mother checks in via Skype. I still get a kick out of seeing her. She says her husband’s office has stayed open, despite the Houston-area stay-at-home order. This seems like a good way for his company to build bad blood with employees.

I call my father and catch him in the middle of a trip to the dry cleaner. He seems frustrated with the stay-at-home order and echoes the “cure is worse than the disease” sentiment. This seems to be the current trope across conservative media and from conservative pundits.

Happy moment: Someone from my university’s alumni magazine e-mails to see if I would write a short perspective piece for an upcoming issue. A light project amid all the dark provides a needed glimmer of fun—even if they’d like me to find a coronavirus angle. Any ideas for what I should write?

I still don’t clap on the balcony at 9 p.m. However, if anything, the neighborhood seems more gung-ho. Someone out there even has bongos.

Thursday, March 26, 2020

All day, the U.S. markets jump up and down. All the market and stimulus rigmarole has started to sound like a joke. I’ve grown tired of looking at the markets and thinking about the markets.

The United States reports that it received a record number of unemployment claims last week.

I feel deep, to-the-bone fatigue all day today.

A language-exchange group that pairs native English and French speakers to practice conversational skills has converted its meetings to virtual. I have my first virtual language exchange. When the Skype pops on, I realize we’ve met before, at an in-person language exchange six months ago. I wonder if she thinks my French has improved, but she doesn’t say. We plan to talk again next week.

I speak with a business contact who works at a senior level in the U.S. health care industry. She confirms the importance of social distancing right now, despite the pundits who say otherwise.

My friend Joanne and I talk via Skype in the late afternoon. We haven’t chatted with video before; seeing her charms and elates me.

Joanne says liquor stores in Houston have stayed open. Given that I caught my dad at the dry cleaner yesterday and that my FrogDog colleague said that her home purchase will stay its course, as home inspections and appraisals haven’t ceased, it seems to me that Houston hasn’t really followed the order to stay at home.

Twitter has gotten livelier. More dialogue, not just one-way posting. Another change I’d like to see stick around.

By evening, our Internet connection has slowed to a near halt. I give up trying and get ready for bed.

Friday, March 27, 2020

I wake up and start work in my bathrobe. I need to catch up. I couldn’t find my stride yesterday.

I stay away from news sites and social media for most of the day, which stabilizes my mood and improves my work output.

People eating lunch in a small lakefront park while social distancing (I think). Let’s assume the two duos of picnickers live together and just decided to have lunch outdoors on a sunny day. Saint-Sulpice, Switzerland. March 27, 2020.

Cases of COVID-19 in Switzerland and in the United States have skyrocketed. Switzerland announces that it has more cases per capita than Italy.

I receive an e-mail from a business group I’ve followed that I haven’t officially joined; my French language skills don’t yet pass muster. The group has planned virtual happy hours and meetings for the near future and offers three months of free membership. I find it less intimidating to attend a video networking event as a first step, given my language barrier. I join.

Saturday, March 28, 2020

Overnight, the U.S. stimulus package gets approved through all official channels.

I get an e-mail announcing adjusted opening hours from a jewelry store in Houston where we bought our wedding rings. Clearly, Houston does not have an effective stay-at-home order. (Let’s not live in a world in which jewelry stores count as “essential businesses.”)

I have two language-exchange calls followed by a Microsoft Teams call with other U.S. business owners to discuss how the stimulus package affects our companies, especially when it comes to the businesses facing layoffs and researching newly announced government-backed loans to stay afloat.

Arnaud and I deep-clean the house. We’d planned to do this on Sunday, but he gets motivated and starts mopping in the middle of my lunch preparation. I hastily eat and we clean. Yes, we argue about this.

I eat a lot of cookies. I feel completely justified in eating a lot of cookies.

I have my penultimate group French class via my on-line program; from this point forward, I will have private on-line tutoring to progress through the C1 level. I can’t find group classes on-line above B2. I appreciate the private lessons, but the small-group classes feel more social.

Sunday, March 29, 2020

I wake up from a vivid dream about Ramona. She remembered me. We had a playful cuddle. I miss her.

I look at the news before my last group French class. Now completely exhausted by the news cycle, I just can’t look at it in depth today.

I don’t have the patience and energy for Twitter, either.

We make cookies after lunch. I feel I have now had too many cookies.

On a call to practice French conversation, my interlocuter tells me that Spain has had to use ice-skating rinks to store bodies. The morgues don’t have the needed capacity.

Arnaud and I have group chats with another couple and with my mom and her husband. Both couples live in Houston. Everyone seems relatively peaceful. We wrap our conversations for the day with a call to his mother in France. She seems peaceful as well. She praises my language progress. I would consider this pure politeness if it weren’t the first time she seemed to understand me when I spoke French. (Small victories.)

And the Story Continues

When I started the coronavirus diaries, I assumed I’d have at least three weeks of entries. Now, this crisis feels somewhat endless. At what point do the coronavirus diaries reach a conclusion? Or, if not a conclusion, at what point do my daily entries become too mundane to share?

As with the last two weeks, I’ve reached bedtime in Lausanne on Sunday night, March 29, 2020. I’ll start a new diary for the week tomorrow morning to post next Sunday at bedtime. (Update: The following week’s diary posted as planned.)

Where this story ends, nobody knows. Not even the writer.

P.S.—For the other entries in the coronavirus diary and other insights and experiences through COVID-19, you can read through my diaries and essays about the coronavirus crisis here.