April, 2021

You’re exhausted because we’re in a pandemic.

  • Because we’re in a pandemic and schools aren’t back to normal.
  • Because we’re in a pandemic and our employers seem to have forgotten we’re in a pandemic when they set their 2021 goals.
  • Because we’re in a pandemic and Black people are still getting murdered by the police regularly.
  • Because we’re in a pandemic and transgender people are being politically attacked.
  • Because we’re in a pandemic and we’re mourning over a half a million dead in the US just from COVID-19.
  • Because we’re in a pandemic and we’re being told to bring our whole selves to work, except the inconvenient political parts.
  • Because we’re in a pandemic and still can’t agree on the rules for creating personas.
  • Because we’re in a pandemic and a ship got stuck in a canal and now for some reason we can’t get Cheetos at the supermarket again.
  • Because we’re in a pandemic and WordPress still isn’t accessible.
  • Because we’re in a pandemic and people still think it’s ok to pay $7.50 an hour.
  • Because we’re in a pandemic and somehow people still find ways to be racist and sexist and ableist even when nobody has the energy to be anything at all.
  • Because we’re in a pandemic and the house is too small or too weird or too expensive to change or fix.
  • Because we’re not working from home, we’re sequestered to our homes and still expected to work in a pandemic.
  • Because we’re in a pandemic using all our hard-earned concert-buying video-game-manipulating skills to try to score vaccine registration slots.
  • Because we’re in a pandemic and not at a conference with our friends.
    Because we’re in a pandemic in an office of 1 doubting whether we’re really good at what we do, even when we’re fantastic at it. And we can’t go out for a coffee with some friends to power through it.
  • Because we’re in a pandemic and there’s no training budget, no structured lunch hour, no whistles to tell us we’re off the clock.
  • Because we’re in a pandemic in an industry that should probably be unionizing left right and sideways but we just don’t have the energy.
  • Because we’re in a pandemic and some people still think it’s a hoax.
  • Because we’re in a pandemic and some people think it’s the perfect time to destroy voting rights.
  • Because we’re in a pandemic and we haven’t seen a doctor in person in 18 months and we’ve had a lot of time to fret over that mole on our forearm.
  • Because we’re in a pandemic and we’re just grateful to be working.
  • Because we’re in a pandemic and frankly we’re resentful to be working.
  • Because we’re in a pandemic and we’re out of work and the offers never seem to be quite good enough, or nobody’s calling back, or the team seems nice but HR is a mess and we don’t know if we should risk accepting the offer.
  • Because we’ve been in a pandemic so long that Animal Crossing feels like a chore.
  • Because we’re in a pandemic and we’re frightened. or bored. Or sick. Or over it. Or all of the above.
  • We’re all exhausted because we’re all still in a pandemic and there’s a really real risk we’re not getting that beach vacation this year either.So, this is your reminder that while there is a light at the end of the tunnel, we’re still in the tunnel.

    Of course you’re exhausted!

    And this too shall pass.

 

Hang in there. We love you.

Author: Anne Gibson

Anne Gibson is a UX Designer and general troublemaker outside of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She's an editor and writer at The Interconnected. She is also published at A List Apart and The Pastry Box, and publishes short fiction when she's not persuading the terriers to stop wrecking things.