Pandemic

After I quit medicine and went corporate (as corporate as tech startups can be, which I guess depends on your vantage point; for me it was and is extremely corporate coming from doctoring), I got really into it and became particularly fascinated to learn how business leaders operate and spend their time (at work and in life) in order to be the most efficient and effective they can be. I guess a lot of people who came up in corporate work (and maybe the culture at large which is often dictated by creatives who may pooh-pooh the corporate life) think MASSIVE EYEROLL when they hear what the latest tech bro thinkboi has to say about optimizing their life and their time, but I actually found it pretty refreshing that in business a spade is called a spade and that spade is a dollar and nobody pretends that we aren’t trying to make money....

In addition to my attention span, another pandemic-related loss not immediately obvious to me (probably because I was too worried about all the other losses, like the human lives, and the general erosion of mental health, and the ability to pretend that the institutions holding up our society would be able to take care of our most vulnerable), which I am only now realizing, has been the in-between moments. The 30 minutes between leaving work and meeting up with a friend for drinks is an in-between moment....

During the darkest parts of pandemic lockdown there was not a lot to do or look forward to so I put a lot of time and energy into making elaborate meals entirely from scratch. (It’s on my neverending to-do list for this website to make some sort of photo gallery of all those meals for posterity, but for now here we are.) Now that I have settled into a new(ish) normal(ish), where thankfully there are other things with which to occupy my time than food prep, I have become a bit more of a utilitarian eater, in that I am less concerned with ✨ thoughtful complex flavorful meals that are time-consuming to prepare ✨ and instead more concerned with 🤜 getting sustenance into my gastrointestinal system 🤛....

Well, Covid got me again. I’m recovering from a second bout after having had it in April 2020. That feels like a different era of fear and confusion—testing was nonexistent, we were running out of toilet paper and Tylenol, and the general guidance was to isolate but go to the emergency room if you were really sick but to call ahead and wear a mask and also if you were sick but not sick sick you should call your doctor (and you better know the difference between sick sick and sick and you better have a pulse oximeter at home, what do you mean you don’t have a pulse oximeter at home?...

RIP to my attention span. The world seems to be opening back up now that we are no longer surging (or are just between surges?), but I wouldn’t say that I feel normal again. Lack of focus has been one of the most pronounced negative effects. For example, I sat down with a cup of coffee and opened up a text editor to write this note about an hour ago and have since abandoned the window no fewer than seven times (see Appendix)....

One of the top priorities when moving to Brooklyn was to have more space, particularly to have dedicated workspace. In our previous apartment, my office was a corner of the bedroom, which I was grateful to have, but also over time resentful. I love my work and my job (probably a litle too much), but seeing my workspace as the first thing upon waking and the last before sleep made it hard for my brain to rest....