Monarch Butterflies danced in a continuous stream across our yard between June and September 2021. We saw nearly a monarch a day and sometimes several, more than I’d ever seen in one summer. Long hours of gardening in this time of COVID brought the amazing migratory journey of these delicate creatures into sharp focus.
A chronic sinus infection had bloomed in my husband’s nose in late 2020, intensifying an already challenging isolation. The cortisone treatments needed to fight that infection put him squarely in the group most likely to die of COVID, especially at age seventy six. The monarchs became a magical, silent, fluttering reminder of the beauty and joy still present in times of sorrow when you can allow yourself to notice.
Intense isolation to prevent my husband’s death had crashed suddenly upon us. Just a few months earlier we had both been unusually healthy and active. Long-held living patterns had to be released, and new ones formed to relieve grief over their loss, compounded by grief over several deaths of dear friends that rolled in on the emotional tide of the same year. Long, solitary walks in wild mountain foothills became a daily habit to soothe my heart, even as they often bumped hard against the limits of one post-menopausal body striving to sustain a lifestyle designed for two.
Thankfully, vaccinations entered the scene right along with the monarchs. My husband’s health also improved. After months lying prone and inert he now was able and willing to do a few chores, engage in brief conversations, read a little and walk a short way up the hill, lifting his spirits out of the shadows by renewing a sense of agency. These gifts of hope allowed us both to more peacefully accept our predicament and the solitary joys of new living patterns.
One early September afternoon a monarch cocoon appeared hanging from a lilac leaf in the back yard. I had never seen a naturally occurring cocoon, even after searching for one each fall since 2017 when we spotted fifteen tiger-striped caterpillars crawling over the garden’s milkweed. Three years later and a year and a half into isolation, here was the beautiful cocoon I’d expected from those plump yellow and black beings hungrily stuffing their bodies with leaves, instinctively preparing to transform.
That tiny cocoon inspired a daily stroll to monitor its progress as my isolation further intensified, while awaiting the result of a COVID test following the first trip of the pandemic; a solo road trip to visit my daughter, her husband and two small, rambunctious grandsons. Each time I sought that tiny green time capsule it remained as it had first appeared, with golden jewels encircling the top of its graceful green pod like a minute space ship or the focal point of a pendant. Despite occasional nighttime buffeting by driving rain and heavy wind, the following morning always revealed only a single droplet of water sparkling on its tip in the sunlight, barely hinting at the earlier presence of a mighty storm.
The drive back from visiting my daughter’s family had been a beautiful tour along winding back roads through the mountains of New Hampshire and Vermont. Arriving home, I had briefly greeted my husband at a waving, calling distance, honoring the possibility that I might have contracted the dreaded virus. Instead of chatting, however, I stopped only briefly before circling the house with my suitcase to place my hand on the brass doorknob leading to the half basement.
That moment is seared in memory. As my hand touched the cool, shiny, golden orb an unexpected flood of physical, mental and emotional exhaustion saturated awareness, coupled with massive relief. I was home again and in a spot where there was no need to interact with another living being for several days. Not only was there unexpected happiness at this prospect of solitude, there was also no sense of anticipated frustration about isolating as a healthy person.
Crossing the threshold I discovered a sanctuary. There was my favorite rocking chair, a small table in front of the futon couch, a folding table with an electric tea pot, herb teas and a solo place setting. There was also a comfortable bedroom with doors that shut and novels from the library on a shelf. Deep gratitude rose for all my husband had added to the necessities I had left there before traveling, creating a restorative nest with a bee-line view of the late summer flower garden.
As is so often the case, our well-conceived plan to protect my husband morphed into an experience very different from the one we’d anticipated. Instead of six days, my stay in the basement lasted well into six weeks, falling ill as I did on the third day from exposure to my two-year-old grandson, who had transformed overnight from a whirlwind of movement into a mucus spewing zombie near the end of my visit. I hadn’t worried about his sickness because I hadn’t fallen ill after previous visits with the boys when they had colds. A call from his daycare provider identified RSV as the probable cause of his disease, a virus most adults have repeatedly encountered throughout life. Knowing I’d avoided ANY illness for ten years, using various preventive health measures, I was confident I’d remain healthy this time also, despite the dangers this virus posed for older adults and munchkins like him.
RSV had another agenda however, which quickly laid me low. Thankfully, the COVID test came back negative as similar symptoms bloomed. Nonetheless, I couldn’t rise to do anything but rest for nearly two weeks. Gradually, the worst of the aches, sore throat and fever abated, along with fear that age and this disease might collaborate to kill me. I could finally raise enough energy to read, which I did for many hours in between drinking gallons of water, herb tea and homemade chicken soup, spending even more hours in a liminal zone between conscious and unconscious daydreaming, napping, drifting, and meditating. Propped during the day on the couch, I also slept there at night because lying in bed gave no respite from a productive bronchial cough that had settled into my chest.
Near the middle of my third week of confinement, I imagined I was on the road to recovery because several consecutive days had included brief strolls outside without much of a cough. Even a walk of respectable length up the steep dirt road beyond the driveway brought only a minor cough or two. The next day I ventured out confidently to drive forty-five minutes to my favorite library in search of books. A brief walk around the yard after returning reinforced a sense of freedom and hope. Stopping to examine the cocoon, I was amazed to find it still intact.
A rude awakening followed sunrise the next morning; my energy had cratered. The previous day’s exertions, small as they’d seemed, returned me to complete rest for another week, after which I repeated the same small adventure with exactly the same result. Clearly, any kind of reasonable recovery time was not in the cards. There was nothing for it but to let go of any thought of when this confinement might end, and to simply be grateful I was not hospitalized with COVID or in need of medication. Antibiotics couldn’t touch this chronic viral bronchitis.
Releasing feelings and thoughts about the future into just being with each moment as it surfaced, quickly releasing any ideas about yesterday or tomorrow which held only yearning and anxiety, I learned to continuously redirect attention to what nourished body and mind just then. Otherwise, no possible relaxation could be had to support any healing to progress. A consistent habit took shape as I continued to shift attention toward full awareness of my body and its various needs; sometimes for rest or meditation and others for new thought patterns sparked by books and movies. I also began to pay more attention to physical sensations, emotions and ideas triggered by the stories I encountered, mine and others’. The whole healing experience morphed into a fascinating kind of silent conversation between the authors, screenwriters and my own experience, providing a depth of reflection only possible while slowing life to a crawl for an extended period of time.
This new habit brought wonder and joy, staving off despondency over my circumstances and deepening contentment over time, reinforcing ever more gratitude for the privilege of safely and comfortably slowing life’s pace, rather than resisting the isolated stillness healing required. Gratitude also grew for this nourishing space and my husband’s love, willingness and relative health that enabled him to cook, fetch and carry for me between naps. He was able to provide whatever I wanted or needed by leaving it on the top step of the basement stairway on my side of a closed door. An accompanying sense of solidarity and compassion rose for all those everywhere who were ill along with me, so many without the comforting resources that supported my recovery.
The concept of serendipity presented itself several times in stories encountered during this seclusion, raising memories of such incidents in my own life that sparked awe and wonder when they occurred. I began to imagine these reminders as mysterious prompts to pay more attention to subtle messages in life’s flow. Opening further to that continuous river of thought and feeling brought awareness of how common such moments actually are when the pace of life slows enough to notice. A sense of the mystery of existence gradually insinuated itself into everything as I drifted through seemingly endless days and nights. As it did, multiple edges of personal identity began to soften and fall away.
Long periods of meditative rest, coupled with short periodic phone conversations with my husband and friends helped disperse the gnawing fear of aging and death, which had ignited in the first intense throws of illness, even as awareness of their ultimate certainty grew. Aging, sickness and death came to seem far less personal and more like an essential part of the moving, shifting, endless dance of creation, from the cellular to the personal to the ecological, planetary and universal, where destruction and creation are unstoppable partners of beauty and wonder. That much wider vision of life began to replace instinct’s central self-referential focus on individual experience.
October and its full pallet of color entered the scene five weeks into confinement, not long after a full moon on the autumnal equinox. The beauty of red and gold outside the window became irresistible, drawing me out once again to gingerly wander the yard. In that brief meandering I found the little cocoon still hanging from its lilac leaf, though changed. The tiny tip that earlier held the sparkling raindrop had split, its sides folded back. The cocoon’s body was a paler shade of green, nearly translucent, no longer the earlier, apparently solid enclosure containing an undefined form.
Rounding the house, I found my husband on the front porch. Delighted to have a chance to chat in-person at a distance, I described the change I’d discovered in the beautiful little cocoon. Smiling, he told me he had just seen a monarch resting on the sunny driveway. At first it had seemed dead. Several minutes later however it started lightly fluttering its wings as if wounded, or perhaps using them for the first time. The fluttering continued for several moments until suddenly it lifted skyward and flew away.
Several days later my body temperature returned to normal from the vaguely elevated state it had held for weeks. I could also sleep comfortably prone in bed and my cough disappeared, except for an occasional dry outburst easily relieved with a gulp of water. Through the cell phone to house phone communication system my husband and I used during my illness, we decided I was well enough to return upstairs. After venturing joyfully into the house I noticed my office calendar still showing August, the month I’d left to visit my daughter’s family. Turning the pages to October, I smiled to discover a lovely photo of a flock of monarchs resting in the sun.
Now I awaken daily to a life beyond the confines of the cozy basement space that still holds a nurturing aura. A subtle, though important shift has occurred in my relationship with this body, its aging and eventual death. Wonder and gratitude for every moment of living remain, no matter what they bring, sustaining me even as inevitable grief rises again. It’s now easier to feel sadness for all who suffer, while also noticing gratitude for the gift of another day right alongside, motivating sustained commitment to identifying kind, generous actions to contribute to healing in every available sphere I can notice.
In memory, 2021 will remain the year of the monarch. Like a hungry caterpillar my mental habits had long focused attention on gobbling life experiences with enthusiastic urgency, clinging subconsciously to joyful living patterns even as the pandemic descended, causing much of my own suffering in the process. Then suddenly the mystery that breathes these lungs planted a common virus in their tiny bronchial tubes, putting me hacking and coughing into a transformational cocoon over which I had no control. Accepting the catastrophes of old age, sickness and death more fully, while coming to respect and honor the physical, mental and emotional limits they harbor, opened an unexpected door into the mysteriously creative awareness humming within every particle of this massive universe. A place where we have the amazing opportunity to live in these bodies for even one precious moment, and where the significance of each body’s experience is at once comparable to a tiny sun sparkle on a wave crest and the infinite mystery of the whole ocean of being and becoming.