Sometimes, it causes me to tremble

I'm in the middle of week 12 of working from home, and yesterday, for the first time in 12 weeks (including weekends), I did not have one video call on Teams, Zoom, or FaceTime. It was a welcome relief not to be seen, not to have to reconstruct missing dialogue in my heads, not to have to ask someone to repeat themselves, not to stare at my growing streaks of gray hair. Taking a mental health day from work definitely helped me to unlock this pandemic challenge. The last few days I sensed myself on a downward slide, using sleep as an escape, having little appetite, and generally feeling overwhelmed by loneliness due to COVID, ruminating on uncertainty about the workplace, and being sickened on ever level by watching a Black man die in front of my eyes on social media, crying out for his mama, and then watching our country burn in response, literally and figuratively.

On Monday, I trembled all day. Thinking I was cold, I turned on the heat. I put on a sweatshirt. I took a hot shower. And still I shook. The words of the African American spiritual came to me, "Were you there when they crucified my Lord? Oh, sometimes it causes me to tremble, tremble, tremble."

I stayed under my blankets on Tuesday until Noon and then took a drive to my favorite park to test out a camera my deceased friend's husband gave me to at Christmas. On a windy day with a new camera, I took a bunch of really bad photos. After my circuit, I lay on the bench of the picnic table, staring at the blue skies above, feeling gravity's heaviness on my chest.

I looked over into the gravel parking lot and noticed a black cat sunning itself. I called for it. It did not respond. I walked over to it, noticing some blood coming from its mouth but without any other visible signs of trauma. It did not protest nor move when I poured water from my bottle on the ground. A man who was finishing his walk came over and told me he had seen the cat earlier under my car. He retrieved an old plaid blanket from his trunk, so we could move the distressed cat out of the sun and into the shade. It did not protest. Another woman walking along the grass came near. "Are you familiar with this cat?" I asked. She shook her head no and started to give it water while the man called the park office. It seemed to take a little water and revive for a brief moment, lifting its head off the ground. And then nothing. Its body gave one last tremble and then became still. My friend Cheryl, whose camera I had, loved cats (she had 12 or 13 of them and fed the strays in a parking lot in the town next to hers). I wanted to weep but waited until the drive home. 

Death is a part of life. I watched a black cat die, and it was sad. I watched a Black man die, George Floyd, and it was an abomination. I don't have any wise words to fill the space here, but I have found the lyrics to "Were You There" to be a good starting point for reflection and hopefully action on my part:

Were you there when they crucified my Lord?

Oh were you there when they crucified my Lord?

Ohh, sometimes it causes me to tremble, Tremble, tremble

Were you there when they crucified my Lord?