The Zen of the quiet life during lockdown

Another one of those eerily prescient dystopian movies — written in 2017 and shot by the end of 2019 — about a pandemic disease that threatens humanity and necessitates mass lockdowns premieres this weekend.

In “The Pink Cloud,” a couple of strangers embarking on what they both believe to be a one-night stand end up stuck together in an apartment for just a little bit longer — 10 years — after a deadly sickness blows into town.

Makes your

Netflix-and-chill months seem like much ado about nothing, what?

For most of us, I would hazard that even the darkest days of the lockdown were more like the George

Booth cartoon on the front of this week’s New Yorker:

First panel: A dog sits by a clock. It is 5:03 p.m. Second: It is 5:05. Third: It is 5:07, the dog sees by turning to the clock. Fourth: The dog turns away from the clock, and it is 5:09. A watched clock never boils.

Necessary COVID-19 restrictions have made life — for those of who are in fact still alive, unlike the 800,000 Americans who have died of the disease in the last two years — more boring than terrifying.

But I have noticed, and perhaps you have, too, that there are those among us who are thriving in the new normal.

They even thrived in the worst of the pre-vaccination lockdowns, either because they are members of the anti-social social club, or because they have discovered that the simple life is a better life for calm, for creativity, for finding that being alone, or alone in your pod of family, has its benefits.

Well, maybe not the worst of it. Let’s call it from just after that time when we stopped washing the groceries.

But once we were able to stop hosing down the cereal boxes, because it was really dumb to do so, and don’t get me started about those stupid temperature checks, they have done well.

Me, I’m the fairly gregarious type, and so even the current omni moment of again choosing to not go out to restaurants, at least the inside kind, is a bother.

But I asked others what it was they liked about what has been wrought, and they replied:

“No expectations!”

“The quietness of the neighborhood.”

“The friendliness of the people who all of a sudden are out on the streets and sidewalks and ready for long chats — distanced, of course.”

“No more FOMO — fear of missing out. There was nothing to miss.”

“The release from the pressure to have to go and things — I don’t have to worry about buying tickets, about getting reservations.”

“Not having to go to cocktail parties and make small talk with boring people.”

And what, now that most people — most people one would care to socialize with, at least — are double-vaccinated and boosted, what do you miss about the pre-vaccine time?

“Those corona cocktail parties on the lawn! All you had to do was put out the (wipeddown) chairs and tables for your guests outside and they brought their own bottles and glasses and snacks, stuff they really liked rather than being forced to imbibe. It was all of the good parts and none of the bad parts about giving a party.”

“For me, it was being able to order your groceries online and have them delivered, or to have a lot of take-out dinners delivered, and not feel guilty about it! I didn’t mind paying extra. I mean, thank goodness we could afford it, and I know for a lot of people it was a burden. But it was good for me, and probably kept a lot of people in work.”

Even for a person who likes crowded bars, and all the blood, sweat and tears they involve, I hear all that. It calls to mind the Zen precept: “Don’t just do something. Stand there.”