Doubt is not the Boogeyman …
What 60 days in isolation made clear to me.
Doubt is not our friend. He enters through an unlocked door or a crack in the window and glides easily into our bedroom at night, whispering words of despair and defeat, until the nightmares arise within and our world turns dark and uncertain.
That pretty much sums up my understanding of Doubt, throughout the first 50 odd years of my life. It’s never something we need or want. It comes unbidden and stays longer than it should. It pokes at our self-esteem, questions our resolve and generally fucks with us until we are a bit wobbly at the knees and start reaching for the medicine cabinet. I have parried with the word all my life and have won some battles and lost many others. In the end, not being all the wiser for my efforts.
But then something changed. As the days turned to weeks and the weeks to months, I have had no choice but to be up close and personal with some of my inner demons; the time to sit and reflect on why they were there, as we all sat on the sofa watching reruns of the X-Files.
The Covid-19 quarantine is not the first time I have ever been alone; that is without a continuing flow of people and perspectives to compare myself to. To measure against, to see if I am still normal or rapidly devolving into someone else.
