Loss, love, loneliness: How we’ve changed
How has one year of the coronavirus pandemic changed you?
That was the question we posed to readers for the anniversary of the Bay Area’s first shelterinplace orders on March 17, 2020. Approximately 200 people responded — with tributes to the loved ones they lost, celebrations of the passions they found and reflections on trying to survive this strange and difficult time. Today, one year after we started sheltering, here is a selection of their responses, lightly edited for length and clarity.
I’ve walked and walked and walked.
I’ve been furloughed from my job since March 2020, so until the restrictions ease up enough to resume, I am homebased and without much of a schedule of appointments or commitments. So what have I done? I’ve walked and walked and walked. I walk every day, usually for at least 2 or 3 miles, sometimes as far as 4 or 5 miles. For the past year, I haven’t been anywhere that I couldn’t walk to, but my southeast quadrant of San Francisco is really a beautiful place to be confined. I’ve enjoyed exploring, as well as revisiting beloved spots. And the shoes I’ve worn on my daily walks? I’m considering having them bronzed as a tribute to the exceptional year of COVID.
Patricia Rose 70, San Francisco
I wouldn’t recognize myself from a year ago.
I live in a different city, with a different haircut, and work a different job. I’ve gained weight and am a much angrier person. As an extrovert, I’ve had to turn to new sources for happiness — food, alcohol and weed gummies. I’m extremely fortunate that I’ve been able to work from home during the pandemic, but as I continue to test my selfdiscipline with shelterinplace protocols, I’ve repeatedly asked myself the question: What’s going to kill me first, COVID19 or my mental health? Anonymous
Will I be able to confidently rejoin the world?
One year of cowering and sheltering at home in fear of contracting or spreading an invisible, deadly disease has changed me in ways that may be permanent. After a year of masks, social distancing and being at home, I cannot imagine ever feeling safe in a crowd. My husband looks forward to resuming travel plans once the pandemic is over, yet I wonder if I will ever feel safe and confident again in a crowded venue like a museum, concert hall, sporting arena or airport. Will I be able to walk on a crowded city street or board public transportation and not feel overwhelmed with anxiety of people being in close proximity? Will I be able to confidently rejoin the world, or will I be afraid, continuing to shelter at home long after sheltering is no longer required? Esther Vigil Suen
72, Daly City
The silence began in March and lasted through April and May.
I tried to teach cello lessons on Zoom, but it is impossible to convey the instrument’s subtleties via a tiny screen and laggard audio link. So I erected a tent on my back patio and began offering outdoor cello lessons. Screened from the street by a tall fence, we are out of sight, but passing walkers can hear the sound of our cellos when the wind blows from the south. Many pause to enjoy the music. Sometimes there is light applause for a wellexecuted etude. But we remain hidden — the mystery cellists of Virginia Street. But not entirely. One neighbor has started lessons, and other neighbors began to recognize the students and offer suggestions: “The one that comes on Saturday morning at 10 a.m. is terrific, but that kid on Wednesday afternoon seems to be struggling with ‘Yellow Submarine.’ Maybe he should try another piece?”
Someday soon, my teaching studio will move back indoors. I will not miss the gusts of wind, the wandering bee or the crashing of the garbage truck working its way down the block. But I have learned a lesson: that live music, inperson education and good neighbors are key to a healthy community. I had always assumed this to be true. Now I know for sure.
Bob Ng
70, Berkeley
I learned that I really really really don’t like cooking.
Pauline Jue 65, San Francisco
In the past 12 months I have spent more time alone than in my entire life.
It’s like my worst fears came true, and I’m still here, FaceTiming with my grandkids, finding comfort in cooking, doing my art, and using this truly awful and isolated time to pay attention to my own spiritual habits and bolster my fierce desire to grow stronger. And I am very strong. In fact, I goddamn rock.
Emily Weil
68, Alameda
The pandemic has resulted in my best year of productivity and personal growth.
I’ve always had aspirations of having a business, podcasts and creative projects that never came to fruition. Since April 2020 I have read 28 books and created more than 250 episodes of podcasts “My Daily Report Card” and “The EP.” I found myself through these difficult times, learning the importance of meditation to dispel my ego and understand my mortality. Like most of the world, I have experienced loss and death of loved ones, and that instilled in me that time is of the essence. Now, I’m looking to graduate this year from UCSF School of Dentistry. I have my eyes and mind open, entering this world with humility, honor, respect and happiness. Rubin Sorrell II
32, San Francisco
One year ago, I was just finishing up a 10month marathon of cancer treatment.
Since April 2019, I had endured months of chemotherapy, which wiped out my immune system and kept me isolated at home. I then underwent surgery, including amputation of both breasts, and slogged through six weeks of neardaily radiation treatments. After having to cancel everything in 2019, I made numerous plans for 2020: a girls’ weekend at the end of March, a meditation retreat for cancer survivors in April, an Alaskan cruise with my family in May. And then COVID19 hit. Just like the previous year, I canceled everything and isolated at home. I emerged from 2019 transformed, only to have life completely transform again in 2020. I spent 2019 losing my hair and 2020 regrowing it. I spent 2019 disconnected from my young son’s school and social life and 2020 as his primary companion and homeschool Zoom concierge. So here we are in 2021. I see the light at the end of the tunnel. We have a new president and vice president who give me hope. We have vaccines that I will gladly hold my arm out to receive. And, most importantly, I am still here. I am alive. Denise Williams
45, Oakland
In an emergency you put on YOUR mask first.
I was a psychiatric nurse manager responsible for a 24bed unit. When the first case hit here in February, I started to wear a mask and asked to call into our meeting in a small room in the ICU. Medical coworkers thought I was paranoid. Meanwhile, patients started coming into the ER and ICU in April with COVID. They all were tested, but most psych patients were admitted to my unit without tests. I am a brave person, but I can’t protect patients or staff from what I cannot see. After 26 years, I retired from my job. I miss it every day. At the time, we didn’t know who this would infect or if we would ever have a vaccine. I thought of my kids. I thought of myself. I left. And it haunts me. I am glad vaccines are here. Before being a nurse I was a flight attendant, and in an emergency you put on your mask first. That’s what I did. Anonymous
I always knew that she would fight death.
My mother was one of a kind — lively and brave, feisty and loyal, smart and athletic and playful. She never met a stranger. I always knew that she would fight death. She was just that way. When she tested positive for COVID and was taken to the hospital, the nurses told us she was fighting them off. I smiled to myself and thought, “You go, Mom!”
When it was clear she would not recover, we grappled with the idea of visiting. I did not want her to die alone. The staff discouraged a visit to the COVID ward as the risk was too high, and we regretfully agreed. Hospice called and said it was time to say goodbye. I can still picture it: sitting on my couch with my young adult children by my side, saying goodbye to my beloved mother via FaceTime, unable to hug or kiss or hold her, unable to whisper into her sweet, soft ear that it was OK to go. My kids told her how much they loved her and what a great mother and grandma she was. I thanked her and told her she did not need to fight death anymore. She died peacefully shortly after. Gretchen Davidson
56, El Cerrito
The year was already going to be tragic for us:
My husband was newly diagnosed with ALS. The pandemic robbed him of seeing his friends, but they found ways to honor and support him anyway. He died in October. Got my second COVID vaccine this week. Soon my mourning will be less lonely.
Anonymous
I realized that I’d felt unseen my whole life, both in the midst of my own family and in society at large.
When the pandemic lockdown began, our tiny pug Dinky was fighting a losing battle with chronic lung disease. She died in my arms the day after Mother’s Day. In the silence and isolation of sheltering at home, my grief engulfed me, until it became a portal for the grief, loss and isolation of the entire pandemicstricken world. But slowly, a kind of peace evolved. As an older, biracial woman, I realized that I’d felt unseen my whole life, both in the midst of my own family and in society at large. Finally, my inner voice broke through, and I began to write poetry that expressed what was
going on inside my head. If the pandemic hadn’t happened, I don’t know if I would have had the chance to carve out a new identity for myself as a woman writer with a goal in life: to write enough poems to fill a book.
Rebecca G.
64, El Cerrito
The oddest thing about our separation is the fact that it is happening in a vacuum.
In early March 2020, my husband and I saw a marriage mediator. We decided to separate and were looking at alternatives to a lawyered divorce. The oddest thing about our separation is the fact that it is happening in a vacuum. It makes me sensitive to the people who are also going through difficulties during the pandemic: losing loved ones, having babies, even homeschooling. Some people know we are separated, most do not. How do you drop that into a fiveminute conversation with any grace at all? It feels like I’m not living an honest life, but right now, who is?
Theresa Bittner
Being alone sucks.
The way I am different from the person I was a year ago is that I have to be more independent. I have to cook my lunch more because my mom is busy working at home. I used to go to school in person, I got to play with my friends, and I got to go on vacation. I learned that being alone sucks because I can barely see my friends, I can’t play soccer at my school. Evan Yoo
10, South San Francisco
At the start of the pandemic, I absorbed myself into dating apps.
I texted, FaceTimed and DMd multiple people, across multiple countries, all day long, for months. The day I decided to admit defeat and delete my apps, I received a message I couldn’t ignore. A match was asking to set me up with her friend. I didn’t even know the match, much less the friend. But I loved the oddity of it all. My first blind date. In a pandemic, no less! What came out of the following months was nothing either of us expected: a deep trust and compassion that became the foundation for a beautiful relationship. COVID19 took so much from me, and I grieved for months. I am still angry, I am still heartbroken, I am still trying to make a deal with the universe to make it all disappear. And so is she. But every night when I go to bed, I have a reason to wake up, a face to kiss, a laugh to hear and love to grow. So here I am, a year later. And I’m not alone.
Emily Nugent
25, San Francisco
I’ve mostly been living in the heterosexual world for the first time since college.
I normally live in both the straight and gay worlds, which are radically different universes. The pandemic closed nearly all the gay spaces in the city and beyond: bars, clubs, gyms, house parties, street fairs, cruises, resorts and the LGBT underground scene. While there were small pockets of gay life still open, I’ve mostly been living in the heterosexual world for the first time since college. To me, the straight world is bizarre and violent and downright depressing. After one year, I’m exhausted by it. When everyone who wants a vaccine has received one, I’m going to tap tap tap my heels together, proudly proclaim, “There’s no place like homo,” and transport myself over the rainbow and enthusiastically back into the gay scene.
Richard Kurylo
50, San Francisco
How simple are the things we need to be happy.
Looking back on the neardaily journal I kept during the pandemic, I expected to find fear, apprehension, boredom, sadness. But for many weeks of shelterinplace, it was something else entirely — gratitude. Thankful for my healthy friends and family, thankful for the pink cherry blossoms frosting the trees. Thankful for cuddles with my toddler, thankful for homemade cake and writing and hummingbirds. Thankful for the rooms that hold me, the ceiling above me. How simple are the things we need to be happy: health, family, a warm cup of tea. As the world opens back up again, I can only hope I’m able to hold onto that feeling. To remember how little we need and how lucky we are. Julie Zigoris
41, San Francisco
I think San Francisco literally saved my life.
Feb. 5, 2020: Nine months ago tonight I sat on my bed and cried. I was depressed because of people getting sick and dying, worried about being laid off from work, not used to wearing a mask, unable to go to movies or theater or any entertainment. I looked in the mirror and hated what I saw. I got on the scale and weighed 400 lb. I had no idea. That night I had an epiphany. I put on my first pair of tennis shoes in decades and just started walking and thinking. I decided to do that every single day until life comes back again. And I have. I’ve left my apartment every single day for the past 276 days, rain or shine. That first day was maybe 10 blocks. Yesterday, I walked 10 miles to South San Francisco. Today I was 292 lbs. Down 108 pounds since May. I still wish I could go to a show and to work and hug old friends again. But, in the meantime, loving my city has helped me be healthier and trying to be happier. That’s a start. A pretty big start, too. I think San Francisco literally saved my life. Jim Linger
54, San Francisco