ASK AMANDA #2: Envy and Survival in the Time of Covid

How to deal lovingly with anti-vaxxers, avoid the dreaded comparison trap, find balance in the chaos, and more

Hello my loves.

Welcome back to Ask Amanda! I hope you’ve all had a peaceful week, and I hope you’re ready for a long read. We have two weeks left to go, and then we’ll decide what to do next. If you have a question, please do send it to AskAmanda@gmail.com (and try to keep it under 300 words or so).

This week I’m going to attack some of the hardest pandemic/Covid questions that came in. But first, a couple personal words.

I gotta say, reading your responses and comments to last week’s post brought me a huge amount of delight and pride in this community. 

So many of you revealed your hearts, and some of you are just phenomenal writers. You’re all doing a beautiful job of reading and responding to one another, and that’s honestly what the mission of this column was.

I wanted people to talk, and listen. And you did. And you hugged, and broke yourselves open, and cried, and you recommended books and links and ideas, and you laughed … and that is how I dreamed it would be. I wanted this to be more of a late-night living room than a Sunday pulpit. 

I want to encourage you to do more of that. Comment. Read. Talk. This is our space, off social media, to speak more slowly, freely, and to carefully share the stories of our lives right now.

If you watched the video-reading I put out yesterday, I mentioned that Penny (from last week’s column) and I had our own beautiful little exchange, and also that Sarah Beetson (our illustrator) and I are mailing her a special print of the art that she made for the post; we’re both going to sign it and write her a handwritten letter. 

I went hunting for Sam (the actual, real-life Sam) and found him through my old French teacher, who knew a group of locals from the coffee shop, who got hold of him. Sam and I also shared a lovely text exchange, catching up, touching base. 

This column is, in its own way, giving me life. I don’t know if I can explain to you exactly how lonely it has been over here in New Zealand for the past two years (yes, it’s coming on two years since I’ve been Covid-waylaid here with my one suitcase), but — pretty damn lonely. This column is helping me.

My own life got thrown into the emotional trash compactor this week, just as I was about to crack my knuckles and quietly sit down to write my column like a good, responsible grown-up.

The news about New Zealand’s border opening (it’s changed dates, again) threw all peace and quiet out the window, and instead of getting my nice, calm desk hours to muse and contemplate, it’s been a shit-ton of unexpected anxiety, logistical Tetris, and theorizing; late nights with jagged sleep, frantic emails, and difficult decisions being made with only a fraction of the needed information on the table. All panic and no prediction. Lots of hurrying up and waiting and biting nails. 

In a nutshell: typical pandemic shit. 

It seems like a common story lately — every exhausted diva character in the Play of Our Life jostles for the spotlight downstage center with fists out and teeth bared, unable to let go of controlling the narrative: The Parent, The Artist, The Housekeeper, The Work Hustler, The Calm One. All of them are underslept, and all of them think the other ones are The Asshole. It’s been a hard week. Write an advice column? HA. I’ve felt like a drowning person trying to throw out a life raft. It’s late, it’s probably too long, but whatever. I managed. That’s the theme right now: “Just kinda managing” is fine. “Barely good enough, but hey” is also fine. 

I’d already decided last week — before the shit hit the fan over here — to tackle a handful of the best pandemic-related questions, and most of these answers are not only discussions I’ve been having in person with my loved ones (sometimes over the dinner table, sometimes over the phone), but many of these answers I’m going to give are arrows directed straight at my own heart. 

You can pretty much rest assured that anything I’m saying to you, I’m saying because I need to hear myself say it … because I need it as much as you do, if not more.

Anthony used to tell a joke about his job (he was a professional clinical therapist), and I suppose it holds true for Lapsed-Rock-Star Advice Columnists. He used to say that people who decided to become therapists did so because they needed 40 hours of therapy a week.

I’m writing these letters to you because they’re keeping me sane. This column is my life raft. If you’re reading it, you’re helping me.

I’ll keep writing if you keep reading. 

………

You’ll notice that the format this week is a little different from last week. Last week I answered a single question and poured out 4,000 words in response. This week I’m going to tie some questions and answers together … I think it’ll work. I SEE THEMES, PEOPLE. (Will someone make me a shirt that says, “I SEE THEMES, PEOPLE”?)

But I also want you guys to feel the beautiful paradoxes and interconnections of all these questions. If you saw my last tour, you may remember how I talked about everybody writing on my Patreon about their problems, and how there was so much “equal and opposite.” The unwanted pregnancies and the abortions, the struggling-to-get-pregnant and the IVF, the incredibly lonely, the stuck-in-a-house-with-an-abuser. I called it The Coke and Pepsi of Suffering — pick your poison. I hope you start to see that, as we read through these questions. Everybody’s got their bag. Or, as my friend Jack said, regarding the pandemic in New York: “Everybody is eating their own uniquely flavored bowl of shit.” What a lovely image, Jack. 

A note about editing: We are lightly copyediting the questions for grammar, punctuation, and understandability. If you didn’t leave a name or sign-off, we’re just calling you Anonymous, or giving you a suitable nom-de-asker.

THEME #1: HOW TO DEAL WITH THE ANTI-VAXXERS IN YOUR LIFE

Dear Amanda, 

My mother is not and will not be vaccinated. 

She doesn’t wear a mask in public. She thinks the supplements she takes qualify as “being careful.” She has been taken in by the worst people in the worst parts of the internet. 

The litany of conspiracies she now believes in is overwhelming to list, much less unravel. The longer this pandemic goes on, the more I think it is what will kill her. Afterward, people will talk about how stupid she was, how selfish. They will be right in a way, but we’ll still have lost a kind, funny, compassionate soul from this world. Much of what she used to be is lost already as she is consumed by this new mindset. I don’t know how to relate to her anymore — everything she says is tinged with QAnon. At the same time, I don’t know how to relate to others who callously dismiss the lives of those like her when they are lost to Covid. 

I can’t defend her actions, but I can’t dismiss her person. 

Can we all learn to care about people even when they’ve made bad/dangerous choices? 

Can we bring our people back from the brink? 

How?

—Lost

………

Hi Amanda,

My ex-wife is an anti-vaxxer. We live in Europe and co-parent a 14-year-old kid. The kid will probably need to get vaxxed to visit the grandparents in the USA, who are aging rapidly. 

95% of our co-parenting is unproblematic, and we mostly agree about practical stuff. Nonetheless, I don’t know how to ask her about going to the USA with the kid. My experience is that when vaxxing comes up, she instantly turns into a fanatic. 

Advice?

—Anonymous

………

Dear Lost and Anonymous,

First of all: I’m really sorry you’re dealing with this. You’re not alone. Literally everyone I know has been trying to negotiate this issue: How do I deal with the antivaxxers in my life? At the risk of stating the obvious, let me just remind you that this is an extra emotional load on top of an already exhausted era in everybody’s lives. If there wasn’t already enough to cope with during a pandemic — the general life upheaval, the constant uncertainty, the deteriorating sense of normalcy — now we have to deal with all this vaccine drama. How fun for us.

About a year ago, I saw a few comments on my social media feeds when I started posting about being very “pro-science” and “pro-vax,” weighing in under the photos I’d gleefully post of my newly-jabbed arm. And there were some comments that stood out from the really ignorable ones that said, “shut up u mosnter the vaccine kills peoples children.” 

These other comments said things like: “But you’re Amanda Palmer and I’ve always respected you. I thought you were punk rock and anti-establishment and I can’t believe you’ve gone so mainstream and sold out so hard.”

I read these comments with the same kind of confusion that I felt back in 2011, when people told me that crowdfunding was bad and evil and horrible and the opposite of punk rock. I was like: hold on, what am I missing? There is nothing more punk than this. It cuts out the suits and the big businesses and the labels and the industry and is basically the online equivalent of selling tapes directly to your sweaty fans after a show out of the back of your tour van. What could be more punk than that? But the people criticizing me then didn’t share my definition of punk rock. They thought that being punk meant not talking about money, kinda the way these anti-vax critics of mine seem to think that punk means disagreeing with the general public consensus about vaccines.

Where I came from, punk rock meant taking care of your community of friends above all else, because you were a tight-knit crew of like-minded weirdos. It meant pulling people up when they fell down in the pit, and it meant carrying your friends’ amplifiers and guitars and drum kits up and down stairs, and it meant passing the hat for your friends’ bands and letting them play in your parents’ living rooms when your parents were out of town. Punk rock — at least as I understood it — meant everybody fucking helping everybody, because the system certainly wasn’t doing a great job of it. It meant making each other safe because nobody else was making us feel safe. It meant circling the wagons in our little basement spaces and making a pact to help each other because, goddammit, nobody else was gonna. And this is where things start to connect back to the questions asked by you, Lost and Anonymous.  

What I see happening with the anti-vax issue feels like a big, broad matter of emotional safety. The question of vaccines and mandates touches off a very triggering trip wire for many people around emotional security and autonomy. I found my emotional security in the music scene, and I’m currently finding it here on this corner of the internet. I understand how it feels to need it. 

Lessons and reflections are always forthcoming from my 6-year-old, Ash. 

Case in point, he told me earlier tonight that he wants to make a “see-proof” waterslide, and I asked, “Do you mean a see-through waterslide?” and he said, “No, see-proof. Nobody can see it!” And I said, “You mean … invisible?” and he said “Not exactly. See-proof is slightly different,” and I said, “How do you make something see-proof?” and he said, “You need see-proof paint, and we need to go buy some, right now.” 

Let’s pause there.

I’ve been very mindful lately of what happens when Ash doesn’t feel like things are secure, and what happens when he doesn’t feel like his feelings are validated. 

When emotional insecurity starts to flood the boat, it doesn’t matter what you do to try to plug the holes. It’s a paralytic catastrophe. The system shuts down.

I don’t try to fix, or correct. Instead, I validate, validate, validate the core emotion. I do not focus on the facts, which are often just plain wrong. Fully fake news. Dear Lost, if you think your mom’s conspiracy theories and QAnon beliefs are nuts, try “I don’t actually have to go to bed right now because I have decided that am never going to go to sleep again, ever, and also I am going to invent a machine that will keep you out of my room forever, and bring food whenever I want.” This is adorable, yes. And, like, super-delusional. Kids do this.

There is “emotional” truth, and there is “hard fact/scientific” truth. 

This is what we must remember: both are TRUE. 

Emotional truth can be validated even when facts are false.

If somebody you love is mixed up in a world of falsehoods, you can still love them. You just have to put some blinders on and do some heavy-duty compartmentalizing. But the love can still be true, and deep and uncompromised. Let’s break it down.

Emotional truth (I am sad, I don’t want to go to bed, I am angry) is subjective; fact-and-science truth (vaccines work, Covid is real) is objective. The key is to try to keep these two things in mind while talking to your anti-vax mom, ex-partner, sister, friend, or whomever.

In Ash’s mind, he really is going to somehow get us to the hardware store, where we are definitely going to buy see-proof paint, and he’s going to paint this fucking see-proof slide, and it’s really gonna happen. He needs that to be true in order for his emotional life to make sense. 

And now here comes me, and my reaction. I have choices.

I don’t tell him: “This is a really stupid idea, there’s obviously no such thing as see-proof paint.” That would just be mean.

I also don’t say, “What a wild imagination you have! What a clever thing to make up, even though it isn’t real!” That would invalidate his emotional world, and break his trust. 

What do I do? I ask him more questions. What is see-proof paint made out of? Once we get the paint, how do we get it onto the slide? Why does the slide need to be see-proof, anyway?

Asking more questions within his reality validates and settles him down without punching holes in his constructed reality, and it also exhausts him and eventually gets him on to the next subject … which is handy especially if he’s on the verge of a temper tantrum because I won’t take him to the hardware store to get see-proof paint (which he knows exists, he swears).

It’s a little bit of a paradox, but it works. 

By continually validating the emotional reality (without discussing the science, or the facts, or, say, the 900,000 deaths in America, insert grimace emoji), you loosen the giant knot of stress and conflict. This builds trust. Then everyone can relax a little. Not agree; relax.

My tack with my anti-vax friends and acquaintances has been to just stick to the emotional truth, and try to radically accept it. Not accept their beliefs. Accept their subjective emotional truth. 

I recently had an exchange with a mom I know from Ash’s school. She approached me at the playground. We barely know each other. Can I talk to you? she said. Sure, I said. Within five minutes, she was in tears, saying things along the lines of I feel like you must hate me because I’m not getting vaccinated, and you’re so pro-vax on your social media. I assured her that I didn’t hate her, and didn’t hate anyone for that matter, and I noticed that her tears stirred my own anxiety about what people must think of me. I found myself questioning my own judgment about posting a jab shot on Instagram. I found myself wondering if any other people were wandering around thinking I hated them and this woman was the only one who had the balls to approach me. My head went to a lot of imaginary places. 

But in front of me was the present moment, and this actual human being, wanting to talk. I quieted my own inner rant and looked at her and said: Listen, I love you and I want your family to be safe, and for you to be happy. Whatever you gotta do to do that, you do it. I’ll never judge you. And I don’t hate you. Don’t ever worry about that. Really. 

She wanted to get into a conversation about the vaccine efficacy itself, and whether it was safe and whether it was fair of the government to impose vaccine mandates. I tried to avoid this conversation like the plague.

If you’re in a conversation with someone who’s anti-vax and you don’t know what words to use, you can say: I absolutely support and understand your right to make this decision for yourself. I’m not judging you. You gotta do what feels best for you. With all the rules and mandates, this must be hard for you, I’m sorry. How are you coping? I’m so sorry you lost your job/shop/babysitter because of a mandate; that must be really difficult for your friends and family. 

Do not add: So, now that things are so obvious, are you going to get vaccinated?

Do not add: I really think you’re making a poor decision, but hey...

Just don’t. In the words of one of my favorite bands: Let it be. Stick to the emotional truth, and let the rest glide away.

I’m a changed woman lately. I used to take every opportunity possible to spout my opinion and state my case. I have edged back on that. Lately, I find myself biting my tongue and making sure I don’t have these unnecessary conversations just for the sake of having them. 

It’s out of character for me (I’m usually loud and opinionated), and I’m finding the very act of avoiding these conversations sort of liberating. Here’s a helpful mantra, when you’re feeling tempted to lean into this conversation but a little part of you knows you could just shut the fuck up: This is not my personal job to fix. It is not my job to change person x’s mind about the vaccine. It is not my job. It is not my job. I am tired. I have other jobs. This is not my job.

But to be fair, Lost and Anonymous, you cannot avoid these conversations: these are your mother and your ex we’re talking about. So let’s untangle these one at a time.

You can empathize with and feel compassion for someone — a parent, an ex, a sister, a co-worker — and not agree with their politics or life choices. You do not have to agree with them, but you can find a path toward feeling compassion for their totally unique human story, no matter who they are, what they believe, or what they’ve done: this is radical empathy. It’s a concept that Jesus, Buddha, Mother Teresa, Bill Hicks, and a whole ton of other wise folks have espoused, and I believe it works. 

Everybody is worthy of love, end of story.

So, okay, Lost, let’s do it. Let’s talk about your QAnon mom. And Lost … I’m really sorry. Watching your loved ones get sucked into a cult of conspiracy theories is not fun.

I have a lot (a lot) of friends with Difficult Mom (and Difficult Dad) issues. The Difficult Mom spectrum ranges from my friends who’ve been exiled from their conservative religious families for being gay, to trying to cope with narcissistic, alcoholic, abusive moms, and the whole lovely range in between, including moms like yours who have gone down the conspiracy-theory rabbit hole. One of my good friends is dealing with this exact problem right now with her elderly mom, and I’ve had a ringside seat. She’s so frustrated. 

I hope, first of all, that you have someone you can talk to about this. Some supportive friends who can bear witness to how hard this is for you. If not, maybe you’ll find some people in the comments section here who are dealing with similar issues, and they can share their coping mechanisms. I’ve watched my friend with the Q-mom mostly just nod and smile when it comes to dealing with her mom.

I think, in this case, it may be all you can do. 

Nod and smile, and validate her emotions. QAnon and their ilk appeal to people who are generally really afraid. Afraid that the system isn’t working. Afraid that everything really is One Big Lie. I think if you ask her enough subtle questions, while laying off the judgment, you might get a closer look at the core of what her fears are and what’s driving the choice to believe the Facebook memes. But if not: nod and smile. You need to practice love with detachment. Love with boundaries. You can love her, but you need to compartmentalize. And if you don’t want to cut ties with her, you can only give her what you can give her. A listening ear. A smile. A hug. A nod of affirmation while she rattles on about how Covid is made from the bones of children. 

You said: “Can we all learn to care about people even when they’ve made bad/dangerous choices?” 

Well, I don’t know if we all can. But you can. I can. I try every day.

You also said, “I don’t know how to relate to her anymore.” Well, you don’t need to relate to her subjective reality. You don’t need to relate to her Q theories. It’s not your job to do that. You only need to relate to her emotional reality. Try to start there. Nod and smile. It is not easy. But as you are nodding and smiling, remind yourself: you are NOT nodding in agreement with her objective reality. You are not nodding in agreement with the Q shit. You are nodding in agreement with her feelings, her emotional reality. And that, I think, shouldn’t be too hard to do if you love her. She’s your mom, she gave birth to you, and you want her to be happy and free from suffering, right? It may be easier for you to do if you think that way and take that tack. Think about this when you smile: I am smiling because I love her, not because I agree with her Q stuff. Then, that smile that emerges from you won’t feel patronizing toward her, or pandering or sarcastic. It’ll be the genuine smile of a son who truly loves his mom. Give it a shot.

Your gift to your mom is the gift of security. That despite her Q beliefs, your love for her is unwavering. Then, you create boundaries. If she wants to talk to you four times a week for half an hour about her Q shit, and you can only handle 10 minutes a week, give her 20. Twist the dials and see what you can personally handle that will also give her a sense of feeling secure and validated. You’ll find the balance. A little can go a long way, and longer than expected when you’re not feeling like you’re pulling teeth.

You also said: “I don’t know how to relate to others who callously dismiss the lives of those like her when they are lost to Covid.”

This is an extra-credit problem, and one of the most important issues of our time. It’s easier to understand “not relating” to the people who don’t hold our views.

Those who would “callously dismiss the lives” of the anti-vax people dying of Covid are really not on higher ground morally than the anti-vaxxers. You cannot claim, on the one hand, to compassionately care about all people, and then callously dismiss any one person when they die (even if they die for stupidly tragic reasons). 

I’d just remind you that your own anger and confusion is pretty common nowadays. It’s hard to relate to either of these positions: the anti-vaxxers (with their seemingly very selfish take on the world) and the “fuck the anti-vaxxers” people saying, “Good riddance, let those dumb people die.” Neither of these positions is really compassionate. It’s just binary hatred chucked over the fence in both directions, with no middle ground. 

But there is, statistically, a huge middle ground, and I feel that 90% of the people I know tend to hang out there. It’s just not very meme-able to say, “I feel like there’s a nuanced middle ground.” Nobody clicks on that sort of stuff. (I know. I’ve tried.) So mostly, don’t feel too alone. There are a lot of reasonable fucking people out there not hanging out at the extremes. Many of them will be reading this column. They’ll hopefully chat with you, and give you some support.

Good luck, Lost. 

Now to you, Anonymous. Your ex, and the kid. I’m sorry. 

So, first of all, you’re really not alone. As I write this, many of my friends are struggling with this exact same problem: their exes and co-parents are anti-vax, and they don’t know how to handle the conversations. Again, I imagine some of the comments below will show that this is a super-common struggle right now, and I hope people weigh in with their own stories and tactics. 

I would say to you all of the same things that I said to Lost above, but add in a really important bit about the kid. 

Once again, kids just want to feel secure. Your kid — any kid with separated parents — needs to feel secure in a few simultaneous dimensions. First, they need to feel secure in the fact that you love them unconditionally. That may be the easiest. Second, they need to feel secure in the fact that your ex loves them unconditionally. That’s harder for you to control. And third, they need to feel secure in the respect that you and your ex have for one another. This is where it can feel impossible. It can be really hard to dredge up the feeling of respect for someone who has lost your respect, for whatever reason. But you can also do an adept jiu-jitsu move here, and even if you don’t fully “respect” your ex’s choice to be anti-vax, you can still respect her emotional world. And that, I would advise, is the side of your reality that you bring to and show to your kid. You can do a lot of validating of your ex’s emotional world in front of your kid, and it will really help soften your ex, because your ex will feel understood, and respected, and heard. 

Start there; it will soften and nourish the ground in which to plant the question. 

Now to the hard part: asking. You want to get your kid vaxxed so you can take them to the USA to see the aging grandparents, and your ex is (probably) going to put her foot down.

I’d suggest focusing the conversation on the grandparents. If your folks are old and this is the only way that your kid is going to see them before they decline too far, you may be able to cushion the ask to be not about the vaccine but about the family connection. It’s a reframing of what the ask is. You’re not asking your ex if the kid can get vaxxed; you’re asking your ex if she’ll support you in your passionate desire to get your kid over to the grandparents while they’re still around. 

Neil and I have a phrase that our therapist armed us with many years ago, and it’s a really useful one that still works to this day. It’s the ultimate trump card in our many discussions and negotiations with one another, and we refer to it as “calling on the partnership.” Once you’ve had a kid together, like it or not, you’re in a lifelong partnership, whether you’re married, separated, cohabiting, or divorced. 

If you and your ex are, as you say, getting along 95% of the time, it sounds like your “partnership” as co-parents is pretty solid. That means you’ve done a lot of good, foundational work to be able to tee up this conversation. “Calling on the partnership” is when one or the other of you makes a giant ask, knowing that it means the creation of potential suffering for the other, but it is framed in the eternal give-and-take: there will be a time, for sure, when your ex has an equally difficult ask to make. This isn’t so much a “keeping score” situation as it is a kind of respect for the long-term nature of your relationship and the fact that there will be many mountains to climb, many vulnerable asks. When Neil and I use “I call on the partnership,” it’s shorthand for: “This is profoundly important to me, even if it means a difficult compromise for you, but we both understand that this sacred space exists in the future, and we may be switching roles six months or six years from now.” 

And just so you know, it’s not a goddamn magic trick. Sometimes one of us will call on the partnership and get the middle finger. Go figure, nobody’s partnership is perfect. But sometimes it works.

If you need some words for your ask, I would try this for a basic outline: We are in a partnership, forever, you and me. And we’ve been doing really well. We can agree that we both love our kid. I really respect you. I know that in the course of the next many years, you and I will both need to come to one another, hat in hand, and call on the strength of the partnership in order to ask something difficult, and I’m about to ask a huge, vulnerable question: Will you let me take the kid to the States to see the grandparents, because we don’t know how much longer there will be to do that? It would mean the world to me if you’d support me in this. I know it’s not easy, but tell me what you think. If the answer’s no, it’ll be really hard for me, but let’s talk about it.

See what I did there? No vaccine. Don’t make it about the vaccine. Make it about the grandparents. If she then brings up the vaccine, things could sound like this: Hell no, Anonymous. You taking the kids to the States means getting the kid vaccinated, and there’s no way I’m going to agree to that.

I would then ask her, gently, if she has any other creative ideas about how the kid could get to the grandparents. If they’re old, they probably can’t safely travel to Europe. So see what she says. If she throws her hands up and has no ideas, then bring the negotiation back to the table, and point out that you don’t really feel strongly about the vaccine, but you do feel strongly about this kid potentially getting to see their grandparents one last time. 

You may be surprised that if you put the ball in her court, and ask her to help you figure out how to solve the logic puzzle, she may just come around, because the logic puzzle may only be solvable though one move: get the kid vaxxed. 

I wish you all the luck in the world with that, and, as a person also stuck very far away from my own family (and all of Ash’s grandparents), I really feel you. I hope it isn’t too long before your kid gets to hug your folks.

That’s what I got, Lost and Anonymous. 

I love you both.

And to everybody reading, please weigh in with your own guidance and advice. I’d be keen to read it myself, and I know these two would too.

xxx,

Amanda

************

THEME #2: COMPARISON IS DEATH

Dear Amanda,

My biggest frustration was hearing people complain about lockdown after only a couple of weeks, when lockdown is basically my life due to illness. 

The initial sympathy for them wore off really fast. This is my everyday life, people, and all you can do is complain about how shit it is. 

Do you think I don’t already know it’s shit? 

All the fun things people put in place to ensure lockdown (think Zoom karaoke, etc.) that gave me some semblance of a life for a while were of course immediately scrapped once lockdown ended. 

How do you go back to a life of isolation and little joy and not be bitter about it when you’ve had a taste of how good it can be when others enter your world?

—Frustrated

………

Dear Frustrated,

I get it. First of all, I’m really sorry you’re going through this. It sounds incredibly hard, and I can hear the pain in your words. I wish I could give you a hug.

I have seen so, so many comments about this since the pandemic started waning. I have a different set of problems being waylaid over here in New Zealand, but I imagine that it’s extremely frustrating to feel that huge influx of energy — especially when it’s a sort of surprising fellowship, accompanied by empathy — and then watch it leave the room just as quickly as it waltzed in. It’s the emotional equivalent of having everyone show up at your college dorm for a party — and you’re there with the foods and drinks and record player and basking in the glow of excitement — only to watch everybody leave your party because there’s a better one down the hall with better food and booze and more glittery people. There’s this sense of powerlessness, and abandonment, and a sense of feeling disposable. And, I imagine, a sense that people aren’t really seeing you and were just tourists on your island for a moment, leaving behind their emotional trash when they got back onto their yacht and sailed away.

The silver lining may be that some people, not all but some, have indeed developed more empathy for your spot on that island. I would give you the advice I am constantly having to give myself, and my suffering friends when we get too gnarled in our emotional cages: stop comparing. 

Comparing is such a tempting pastime, but it will never work. It will only embitter. There will always be those more fortunate, less fortunate, more mobile, less mobile, more ill, less ill.

You also never actually know what those people on that outgoing yacht are going through. The yacht they got on may be riddled with rats and rotten food. You just never know, and to assume that someone’s life is more or less enjoyable than yours is a dangerous assumption to make. In my experience, people’s lives are never, ever what they appear to be at first glance. So cut yourself a break and stop looking over the fence or at your classmates’ work, and focus on your own. 

You said: Do you think I don’t already know it’s shit? 

Well, pause. Just because they’re saying that it’s shit for them doesn’t mean they are making any objective judgments on your life, or that your life is, by association, also shit. Make sure you untangle what they are saying about their lives, versus what they are intimating about yours. 

Are they saying, “Your life is shit” or are you just hearing that when it isn’t being said? If so, that’s on you.

And, perhaps, if they are making a judgment about your life, call on their empathy. It can sound like this, more or less: I hear you saying your life was “shit” when you were housebound. Do you realize that I live like that all the time? That situation isn’t — and doesn’t have to be — shit, you know. It’s just a set of restrictions, creatively surmountable, and I wonder if it’s made you understand a little more about me, and the reality of my everyday life. Where you were a tourist, I live. Maybe you can understand me a little better now.

That may create an opening for empathy, for connection, and for the possibility of things that gave you life, and excitement, and joy. 

You said: How do you go back to a life of isolation and little joy and not be bitter about it when you’ve had a taste of how good it can be when others enter your world?

Joy is subjective. I know quite a few people who are wealthy and physically unhindered, who travel the world, eat in restaurants every night, win awards, and appear on all fronts to be freewheeling and hyperconnected in the big, wide world. Some of those friends are occasionally suicidal. Freedom of movement doesn’t guarantee joy.

It’s really shocking when you start to meet the successful and jetsetting people of the world, only to find out that they’re feeling paralytic isolation and little joy. This may not make you feel better, but it may add some fuel to your perspective. Whether or not you’re bitter is always going to be up to you. 

My personal prophylactics against bitterness (and fuck, has bitterness been extra-tempting these past few years) have been my mindfulness and gratitude practices. 

Whatever I want to complain about, I can always bring it back around to what I’ve got: my ability to make art. My ability to think thoughts. My ability to enjoy a book, a sunset, a piece of music. I start with a grab at whatever I can, and I put my focus there. If I start toppling down the path of bitterness (and I often do, and I notice it most when I’m sitting in meditation, watching my monkey-mind careen out of control as it starts listing a catalog of grievances and unfairnesses), I just back up the truck, take a deep breath, and start again. I have life. I have my breath. I have my hands. I have Ash. I focus on the love I have: my love for myself, for my imperfect fucking body but goddammit it’s what I’ve got to work with, and it’s not dead yet, so I better be grateful for it; the love for my friends and family, even the difficult ones, and on and on. This is a good practice to cultivate, and I recommend it. It really, truly, helps stave off the bitterness. If you need some specific guidance, I’m happy to discuss further in the comments and recommend some meditation apps and books, and I’m sure the folks in the comments will weigh in as well.

And if, indeed, there are some people out there who have achieved a richer understanding of what it means to be housebound, ill, or stuck inside … I’d suggest following that trail and leaving behind the friendships and people who don’t really “get” it. It can be hard to weed out the fair-weather friends, but I’ll tell you from experience, it’s worth it, and it’s a lifelong gardening project. Fair-weather weed-pals suck time and attention out of the ground from the more nourishing relationships. And time and attention — the fundamental building blocks of love — is all we’ve got to give at the end of the day. So don’t give your precious energy to the people who don’t, and won’t, care about you. Give it to those who have the time and attention to see you, how you are. I’ll give you a hint: your bitterness will not water the garden.

If nothing else, I hope some of the comments below will speak to this, and you may wind up with a brand-new Zoom karaoke group of people who are just as fucking frustrated as you. If you do it, please invite me. I do a mean karaoke “Never Enough” from The Greatest Showman. 

Love, 

Amanda

………

Dear Amanda,

I have a question about envy.

I still don’t feel safe. I have my vaccinations and my booster, as does every adult in my house.

I see some friends and family going to Broadway shows again, and I think they are being incredibly foolish. I am also deeply envious that they are doing these things.

There is little I desire more than to be singing again — with other people. Alone in my house doesn’t count. I want to be in a play again and truly appreciate the ludicrous intimacy it affords. Readings online do not count. At the same time, when invited to help put together a theatrical project, I cried saying no. Music and theatre feed my soul, and the work on my own is leaving me empty.

The more I long for this, the more I crochet. I’ve made too many scarves this year. I may make a shawl next.

I try to balance what I see around me with what I know about the state of our hospitals and insane infection rates. And this envy doesn’t leave me. 

I want to use it as a tool, and I feel stuck. What do I do with it?

—Envious

………

Dear Envious, 

What do you do with it? You gotta sit with it. You’re not gonna like it, but you gotta.

I would say to you almost exactly what I said to Frustrated up there: comparison is death.

Your choice of words is telling:

Alone in my house doesn’t count … Readings online do not count … I’ve made too many scarves this year…

Is this really true? 

Does singing alone in your house not count? Do readings online not count? At all?

Have you really made too many scarves? 

I think what you’re trying to say is: I’d rather be doing other shit than making these scarves, but here I am, making fucking scarves.

This is a question of what you’d prefer. 

And good lord, do I get it. You’d prefer to be out seeing Broadway shows, and singing in groups, and making music in sweaty rooms with real, flesh people. I see you. This is close to home for me.

I have yearned, over these past few pandemic years, to escape the domestic cubicle I have found myself living in here in New Zealand and go back to the world I feel way more comfortable in: theaters, bands, nightclubs, singing, glitter, mayhem, drinks, dancing … all of that.

And yet that is not what I have been doing. 

I have been gardening and taking care of a kid, making endless daily peanut-butter-and-jam sandwiches, taking yet another trip to the only toy store on the island on a rainy day because it’s lockdown and there is nothing to do but another fucking Lego set on the fucking floor of the fucking living room … and also I feel like I’ve spent two years doing dishes and cleaning a fucking house.

This is not what I would prefer.

But I would not say, at this point, that I’ve made too many sandwiches. Or done too much Lego. 

You have not made too many scarves. You’ve just … made scarves. 

I’ve done Lego. You’ve done scarves. We are not seeing Broadway shows, either of us. Nope. 

That’s what’s happening. 

Am I envious of my friends in New York and London right now? Yeah. But also, I’m staying here, because it’s wiser than taking the kid back to the States right now. I’m making these choices for a reason.

I made a really deliberate choice to stay in New Zealand, and you’ve made a really deliberate choice to not go to Broadway. Once the choice is made: it’s made. Now, we sit with it.

If you want to use your envy as a tool, try this: Yes. There is a part of me that is envious. They are doing that. I am doing this. But also, what I am doing is fine. I’m not making too many scarves. Singing in the house counts. Readings online count. For now, it has to count. There is a part of me that is envious. That’s fine. There’s also a part of me that’s decided to stay in this house. That’s fine.

The “stuckness” you refer to may be coming from the fact that you cannot accept the envy, and the situation. I mean, let’s face it. This situation blows. But it is the situation.

Like I said to Frustrated up there, I recommend a mindfulness practice. It helps with the sitting-with, with the acceptance. And that acceptance, when it comes, will hopefully free you up to enjoy yourself a little more, in this absolutely not-fucking-ideal moment. 

You said: I want to use it as a tool, and I feel stuck. What do I do with it?

The problem is that the tool is shaped like a screwdriver, and you want it to be a hammer. 

To use the tool correctly, stop hammering, take it into your quiet heart, close your eyes, feel its true shape … and find the screw that will loosen.

It’s there. It’s shaped like the part of your heart that knows how to sing in the house and find joy in it, that knows how to do readings online and laugh out loud with the people in the virtual room, the part that knows how to find nourishing connection with friends and strangers even if it’s through a screen or on a stoop in the cold; it’s shaped like the part of your heart that knows you haven’t made “too many” scarves, you’ve just made a lot of scarves. Package those scarf-y fuckers up and mail them to your friends and loved ones. Send one to me. I’ll wear it; it’s gonna get cold in New Zealand soon. Connect the dots. Fuckin’ Zoom karaoke with Frustrated up there. 

Until this pandemic really ends and releases us from its maw, we will need to constantly loosen those screws, be creative, and, for god’s sake, stop comparing yourself with the folks who are making different choices. It won’t serve you.

I love you tons. In scarf I trust.

Amanda

************

THEME #3: WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK … AND HOW?

Dear Amanda,

Ask, and you shall receive. This is a question, a statement, maybe a cry for fucking help. I’m stuck somewhere between wanting to throw caution to the wind and making out with a stranger on the subway while living the bohemia of the New Roaring ’20s, to drink in art and experiences, or hiding in my cabin and never leaving.

I feel utterly trapped by wanting to just jump into the beauty of all this art that is flowing and desperately longing to reconnect with community and also not wanting to die.

I want to be cautious but not live in fear.

Can we discuss balance? 

Where is it?

What is it? 

How do we find it? 

Does it exist? 

This is a lot of questions. Best of luck. 

—Trapped

………

Dear Amanda,

Here’s the background. I’ve been 20 years+ with my partner, and the past few have been a huge struggle. 

Covid has increased the strain by loss of my job, being repatriated home while we still wait for work to return, bumped from rental to rental, dealing with a range of heavy family issues, etc.

It’s all gotten too much, and I’m overwhelmed and caught in a negative space. 

I have limited access to therapy at the moment, but generally I don’t have any emotional support. I’m a mess. And this column is where I’m feeling safe to come with this question:

How do we start to reconnect emotionally and physically again when we have so much anger and frustration toward each other? The thought of physical connection feels awkward and difficult for us both now. 

When I try to think of how to emotionally reconnect, I just feel numb and my mind goes blank. 

I’m so stuck. This feels so shit. 

I’m exhausted and I feel the intense pressure to commit myself now to fixing the relationship, as I feel the window will close soon. 

—Struggling

………

Dear Both of You,

We would be fucking crazy to think that this moment on earth isn't fucking crazy. 

We need to validate just how crazy it is, and how many voices in our heads are clamoring for attention all at once. 

I have to fix my relationships. Right now. I have to figure all this shit out. Right now. I want to go out. I want to stay in. I want to make up for lost time. I want to fucking hide forever. I want to apologize for everything I have ever done wrong ever. Wait, no, fuck everybody. Wait, no, I want to fuck everybody. Wait, no, I want to fuck no person ever again.

This is what the inside of my head looks like most days. It’s entertaining.

The voices start to merge. Confusion reigns. 

All these feelings and this confusion are normal. It's nuts out there. I remind you once again: We are all tired. Very, very tired. When we are too tired, we short-circuit. Pretty much everybody I know has short-circuited. And this is a sane response to an overwhelming situation. We can become paralytic. Think about our distant mammal cousins; it’s a little like a possum playing dead. When you have no other choice and running is not an option, and the predator of insane-earth-reality is a few feet from you, it can feel like the only option is to shut down and hope the predator loses interest and walks away.

This moment is insane. This pandemic situation is insane. We are being asked to walk a tightrope between two buildings with no guarantee that either building isn’t going to collapse in the next few minutes, while juggling kids, careers, technology, love lives, illnesses, all of life. Not to mention the impending climate crisis giving us all an instant existential meltdown even if we figure out the other shit. I mean, it’s a lot.

Here is my emphatic advice to both of you, and it’s advice I’ve been giving myself nonstop for the past three months: DO NOT DO THE THINGS NOW. 

Really. Put as much on ice as you can: work decisions, relationship rewirings, choices about whether to buy a goat and move to the hills.

WAIT.

I am hoping to go home to New York in a few months, having lived in New Zealand for two accidental fucking years. I feel like I’ve run a hundred emotional marathons. I feel like I have utterly changed as a human being. I feel like I can probably do anything now that I’ve endured what I’ve just endured. 

And do you know what I am planning to do when I get home? I have lots of options. All my projects are delayed. I have a record I was supposed to make with The Dresden Dolls, I have a book I want to write, I have tour and speaking offers, and (see my letter to Envious above) many, many Broadway shows I wanna go see.

You know what I am going to do?

Almost nothing for at least six months. 

I am going to go home and hide, and recover from this shitshow. I am not going to figure out my relationships. I am not going to tour. I am not going to crack into a book. I am not going to take my kid on a road trip across the States while he’s still this young and I have the time. I am not going to gear my life back up just because I’ll finally be able to. Fuck. Everything. No.

I am going to REST. I am going to do as little as I can to keep the bills paid and the lights on (including, probably, writing this column), and I am going to rest.

These past two years in New Zealand have been, in some senses, idyllic, the way being trapped in a house on an island can be, y’know, idyllic. I planted tomatoes. I have barely left the kitchen I am typing this from for a year. It may sound restful. But it has not been restful. Every single day has been colored with pain, stress, homesickness, uncertainty, and a constant sense of dread and nerves. I need to recover from that. EVERYBODY DOES.

I heard a great metaphor when listening to a vaccine scientist talking on the radio the other day. He said, “We are building this plane as we take off.” What a beautiful image. That’s what I feel I have been doing for two years, nonstop. Making instant decisions based on practically no information. Stressing out that the plane won’t fly, that things may crash and burn, but I still have to build, because there’s no choice.

You also eventually have to land the plane, and you cannot land a plane in a rubbish dump. 

You gotta clear the runway for a gentle landing. 

This pandemic is hopefully coming to a close, and we are all hoping to stop circling our emotional planes and finally land back on earth after a two-year holding pattern. But you have to think hard about what your landing conditions are. 

You need to make space and time for healing and processing. You just have to. If you make decisions while you’re still in the jaws of the stress, you’ll make bad decisions. 

So, personally, I am putting everything on ice: the fractured and fragile relationships, the career problems, the tax issues (I’m not even opening that folder) … I am putting as much on hold as I possibly can.

Want more plane metaphors? I’m on a roll. 

Airport landing strips and tarmacs have a feature called expansion and contraction joints. Landing strips aren’t one solid piece of concrete. They’re an assemblage of giant concrete slabs all fit together with NASA-grade glue that can expand and contract up to a foot in very hot or very cold weather.

Your life needs these expansion spaces. If you do not leave room for rest, recovery, and adequate processing time, I guarantee you, your ride will not be fucking smooth. And I hate to say it, because it’s always in short supply, but these expansion spaces in our lives are made of only one material: time. 

So first things first, both of you. GIVE IT TIME, THEN DO THE THINGS. Like I said to Envious, sit with it. If you can afford to put it on ice right now, do it. Rest. Allow. 

The next choice will then be able to take off with smoothness and grace, whether it’s fucking the stranger or going to a Broadway show or breaking up with your partner.

Same, same, same. 

You cannot land this plane when you’re too tired and the runway is shrouded in garbage, OKAY? Promise me.

I love you, Trapped and Struggling. 

May you both fly safe.

Amanda

………

That’s it for this week, dear ones. See you down in the comments.

Don’t forget that if you join the paid subscription tier, I’m making video recordings of the posts as well, with extra chatter. I’ll be putting this one out as a video in a few days. 

………

HOUSEKEEPING & CREDITS

Comments and discussion are encouraged here. Talk to strangers. Reply to comments. Share yourselves.

Please be kind.

And please share this letter if you feel moved to do so.

If you have a question for a future column, you can email it to AskAmanda@gmail.com, and please try to keep it under 300 words and let us know whether or not you’d like to remain anonymous. We are reading everything, and thank you all for writing in.

Thank you all for supporting this experiment! I will be publishing Ask Amanda here on Substack once a week throughout February. Two more weeks. Then we will decide how to move forward.

I love you all so much. This is really fun. I love DOING this.

Ask away, and see you all next week.

xx

AFP

Original artwork for Ask Amanda is by Sarah Beetson.