The coronavirus pandemic has changed the lives of countless people across the state of Maine. With new cases still on the rise, Mainers have had to alter their daily lives, going about mundane tasks as they have never had to before.
Because many people are still working remotely and children are in the house more, the COVID pandemic has limited our range of motion not only in public spaces but also at home. ErsinTekkol/Shutterstock.com
For one of my classes, I recently read philosopher Michael de Certeau’s “Walking in the City” from his book “The Practice of Everyday Life,” published in 1980. The chapter describes pedestrians in New York City and the relationship between walking and one’s sense of “place.” Since reading the work and discussing it in class, I have found myself thinking about walking, or movement in general, and how much our everyday motions have changed since the pandemic hit last year.
I spend a lot of time at home, either helping with my family or working toward my degree. One of my favorite pastimes is going to the grocery store, walking through the aisles in a very specific pattern; one learned from years of observing my mother: produce first, the deli, meats, back to Aisle 2, so on. The rhythmic motion of gliding through the store is ingrained in my soul, a calming routine that grounds me. However, the pandemic has changed this with arrows forcing us to walk in particular ways, distancing rules preventing us from easily maneuvering around and face coverings that keep us from sharing smiles with one another.
Our movement is not just limited in public spaces. For many Mainers, home life has changed, with children in the house more, loved ones working remotely and an overall sense of fatigue lingering in the air. Daily locomotion has been affected by the pandemic. Someone is now unable to pace through the living room while enjoying their coffee because their spouse is on the computer, and another person is missing their daily walk to pick up their child from school because, instead, they are learning from home.
The act of moving our bodies through spaces is not only routine, but also comforting, anxiety-reducing. Walking through our houses, meandering in the grocery store or passing someone on the sidewalk are typically natural motions. However, with the dangers of COVID-19 weighing on us, we have to always be more aware, calculated and even deliberate with our movements. We have to avoid walking in front of a computer camera, we must follow the lines in a grocery store and we become more cautious passing people outside.
When something as simple as movement becomes a task, forcing us to think about how we go about our daily lives, it becomes draining, modifying our relationship to place as we try to find new ways to exist in them. Our homes become work, the grocery store becomes the supplier of a new stressor in every aisle and even the beauty of the Maine outdoors becomes confining.
The coronavirus does not seem to be leaving in the near future, so maybe we change our movements in the meantime. Until we can walk freely in our house again, maybe we have our coffee in the kitchen and find a corner where we can sway back and forth or pace. Perhaps we park in the farthest parking spot from the grocery store, taking deep breaths and enjoying the fresh air before entering a place where movements are dictated. Maybe we even find a new place to explore outdoors or develop a routine walk in our backyards.
The pandemic will not last forever, but the need to move will always be human nature. It is more important than ever before that we re-establish our relationship with movement, we nurture it, we find ways to love it because movement is intrinsic to our health: mental, emotional and physical. Coronavirus has robbed Mainers and people all over the world of many things, but we cannot let something as natural as the joy of movement be one of them.
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