The ups and down of life: Lent 2021, Day 29

I can't really complain, but here's a benchmark from which to look up (or to look down from); today is the fifth day I'm feeling mysteriously under the weather. I've not been out for a walk since Friday, and though I'm not getting worse, neither am I getting better. Outside, the weather is grim (overcast again, temperatures just above freezing, no sign of spring). Social contact is drying up - the general malaise, ennui and Weltschmerz seems to have overcome everyone. People are retreating into their shells, switching on 'survival' mode, going quiet on social media. Motivation is waning, winding down; "Lord, I believe it's rainin' all over the world/I feel like it's rainin' all over the world".

Yesterday marked the first anniversary of the original Polish lockdown. It proved so successful that Poland avoided a first wave, got complacent, opened up, went on holiday, schools and universities came back - and then by 5 November, over 27,000 new cases a day. As many new cases in one day as in three months of lockdown combined. Today, over 25,000 new cases were announced. Since the November peak, 40,000 people have died of Covid and there's no sign of the pandemic relenting, and (unlike the UK), vaccination is going terribly slowly, so we can't even look to that for hope.

Maybe I have a very mild case, or maybe it's something else; general achiness, fatigue, vague cold-type symptoms. Schrodinger's Covid - it is/isn't until you open the box with a test. The word samopoczucie - 'general physical and mental well-being' (PWN-Oxford) - is an example of a useful word having no direct translation into English (a bit like malaise, ennui and Weltschmerz). And here, my samopoczucie is worse than at any time since early February 2019 (five days without a walk).

But things will turn around. They tend to. Bad patches are replaced by better patches; the bad times are there to make you feel gratitude for the good times. Feel gratitude, and you don't get complacent. Get complacent and you fall. Know that good times are followed by bad times - the Wheel of Fortune - but not quite. And here's the trick. To know it's not a wheel, but a spiral. When you end up where you were in the last cycle, you should be one notch up, one meta-level higher - higher in understanding, in a higher state of consciousness, than before.

Funnily enough, since addressing my mind to this post, I've cheered up! 

"This is life. You have to see these things as expressions of God's will - you don't have to like it of course! Things aren't so bad - look at the parking lot, Larry! Just look at that parking lot..." There you go, Rabbi Scott, the First Rabbi from A Serious Man has just come to mind, my spirits raised, I shall go and switch the sauna on.

This time last year:
Seeking a religious symbol with meaning

This time two years ago:
New views

This time three years ago:
Humanity in a Creative Universe: a summary

This time eight years ago:
Always let your conscience be your guide

This time nine years ago:
Lenten recipe with prawns 

This time 12 years ago:
Polish economy - recession thwarted