Over the last four days, there’s been a definite adjustment in our COVID directed lifestyle. First, I have felt a disconnect to my early vigilance warp into a enlivened energy to be creative in the wine cellar and forget, sometimes, my efforts to combat the virus. After Monday, there was an uneasy emotion I couldn’t describe until late in the evening, and it was the knowledge I had let my guard down. Being vigilant in non-sterile environments is so much harder than the old clinical days when being sterile in necessary environments was a stringent discipline. Now, it’s a hit and miss rule of clean-dirty-clean-whatever. I was forgetting to wash and clean after entry to different customer levels of the store and restaurant. I was forgetting the masks can’t be touched to adjust when on the face by contaminating the portions covering your nose and mouth. I was not focused on my health but on the business at hand, wine. Tuesday was a slowdown to mindfulness, and I was more mentally prepared. I also came home to my apron, cooking, and a cocktail with Christine along with a sigh of relief that I had gotten back to safe practices. As the weather dampened outside the next two days, I became laser focused on a routine that was beneficial for the first two months of this semi-quarantine, and at the same time, Christine and I had gotten back to Dominoes, cribbage, and discussions of family and finance. Four days of adjustment were just that, adjustment. I can think of numerous analogies, but from my playing days, it would be how stance, hand position, and swing would be changed based on the pitch count, how many were on base, and how many outs. Or for each new batter, what pitch to make based on the same circumstances, and through all of those adjustments, change became routine, and routine became security. Over these last four days, I had to get back to security.  Within that muck of explanation, the one piece I have yet to establish is the daily visit to the writing studio. I can’t seem to tax my brain to make that happen. I think about it, but now that I am able to open that door under new state guidelines of allowance, I can’t get there. The house has become too comfortable, too safe. This Friday, May 15th at 8:41 a.m. in Petoskey, Michigan, as the rain and fog open their curtain to the sun, I know I will not get there tonight. I will take a breath at home knowing another four days of adjustment are ahead, and I will eventually get there. Baby steps. Safety. Security. Being alive.