As the coronavirus has swept the nation off of its feet, I can’t help but notice the tone of my social media feed becoming somewhat dark and lonely. Sure, people are sharing lighthearted memes, but laced between those bouts of humor are serious concerns about isolation and boredom.
My dad retired from the military shortly after I graduated from high school. For the entirety of my life before leaving for college I was a military kid—who am I kidding?! I still tell people I’m a military kid, but that's beside the point. What I am trying to tell you is, that I was actively a military kid for the first 18 years of my life.
I know you’re probably sitting there thinking “Maggie, growing up as a military kid and how people are feeling about the coronavirus are two mutually exclusive things”. Well, friend, I’m here to tell you that’s not exactly the case.
There are actually quite a few lessons that I picked up as a military kid that has made navigating adulthood quite a bit easier. As I scroll through Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, I can’t help but notice that I am not processing the impact of this global health crisis the same way many of my peers are. Upon realizing that, I initially felt guilty, like it was because I didn’t care about the world and the people and how this was changing my life, but after I gave it some thought, I realized that I had a slight advantage to a situation such as social distancing. I was raised as a military brat, I spent my whole life going through bouts of [what felt like] social distancing.
I’m sure that anyone that moved around during their formidable years can tell you when you first arrive at a new duty station, you feel pretty isolated and distant from all of your new peers. No need to fret! There’s usually a happy ending where we make friends, and everything works out ok. For that time between when I would finally assimilate into our new community and when I first arrived, I learned how to manage the loneliness. Especially now with social media and increased access to the internet, staying connected to people is easier than ever, but it wasn’t always like this. When I was growing up, we had to get pretty creative. I remember handwriting and mailing letters to friends that had moved away.
The state of the world right now is not exactly the same as the environment I learned to adapt to, but some of the best practices that I employed throughout my younger years can be applied and to help feel like you’re still a part of a community and get past being quarantined can make anyone feel.
Nothing I’m about to share is a novel concept. I didn’t invent these ideas and I probably won’t be the first or last to recommend them to you. I’m just here to remind you that they actually do work.
So, here you go: a military brat’s four best practices to keep from being lonely:
1. Answer the phone.
I think this one should be most obvious. Every time someone calls you, just answer it. I know we’re used to texts and avoiding the awkwardness of phone conversations, but hearing someone's voice, and letting a conversation go wherever it may lead, is a great way to connect and crank up the endorphin production (I’m unsure of the science to back that statement). After I graduated high school, I went out of state for college and most of my friends stayed in North Carolina. Some of those friendships grew apart and distance did what distance does, but some of my friendships are still alive and well today. My best friend still lives states apart from me, but I’ve made a consorted effort to always answer if she ever shows up on my caller ID.
Conversely, call someone instead of casually text them. One of my favorite things to do is to send someone something that I think they might enjoy and call them almost immediately after it’s confirmed as sent. I do this all the time to my siblings. Whether or not they enjoy this practice, I’m sure they’d never honestly admit to me, but I love being a part of their reaction. All of my siblings live in one state and I live in another (for now), so I miss a lot of the daily interactions that we used to have with each other, but this suffices. Sometimes it leads to more laughter or thoughts that would not have occurred as naturally if the conversation stayed in text.
2. Look at old pictures.
This might be a favorite trick of mine. I do this all the time, even now. When I want to evoke a certain feeling or I start to remember something that happened once upon a time, I go to the pictures. Everything is on Facebook or in the super accessible cloud, so with a few swipes, some back and forth with autocorrect or the face recognition, all of the memories I was to see are right there.
Right now, I’ve been scrolling through my wedding album over and over again. Obviously, like any millennial bride, I’m obsessed with my wedding day, but really, I love how happy that day made me feel, and when I look through those pictures, I feel that same kind of happiness again. I’m not really in a funk or dealing with any negative emotions, I just like looking at pictures and remembering happy memories.
My husband and I recount our wedding day just for kicks and giggles. We don’t have any pictures of this, but we found out that when most guests left our open-bar reception at 10 p.m., they found their way to the National Mall and drunkenly explored the monuments. We found this out slowly as more and more people would tell us their intoxicating tales, and eventually, we figured out that roughly 2/3 of the guests did this. We think it’s so great and laugh every time we think about it. Honestly, I think we’ll still giggle at that in 50 years too. I know I said “look at pictures” then told you that something we love to remember has no pictures, but had we not sifted through the wedding album so many times, we never would have started telling stories of the people that surrounded us on the most special day of our lives. And that is the point: looking at reminds us of time spent with our favorite people
3. Make new friends with old friends.
There is no time like quarantined time to reconnect with people you may have lost touch with. Start small by reacting and commenting on their social media posts, chances are they’ll be glad to rekindle and have another friend too. Who knows where that may lead your friendship?
I remember Facebook started to get big while I was a freshman and sophomore in high school. Just before starting my freshman year, we moved from Virginia to North Carolina, and I started at a new school. For most of my freshman year, I made a few friends, but not many. I wasn’t on a sports team, hadn’t quite figured out getting involved in clubs, etc. but then Facebook opened up to anyone. My mom let me join (I was 13, parental involvement was key to anything in life at that age), suddenly, I was able to connect with people from my old school and cheerleading team. It seems like my friends were present in my life again.
While I recognize that this requires a bit of vulnerability, I’ve never had to experience of it going wrong. Around our final year in college, one of my best friends and I had grown apart (neither of us remember why). For almost 3 years after graduation we didn’t talk, we barely even liked each other’s pictures on Instagram. One day she posted something that was a really great life update. Maybe it was an endorphin high from a 5 a.m. workout or maybe the moon aligned, but I decided to message her and tell her I was really happy for her. A few months later, we’re right back to where we left off. She even came to my wedding. So, I would say that this one is definitely worth pushing your comfort zone for!
4. Talk to yourself.
This one is super weird. I know. But ask yourself: when was the last time you had the opportunity to have a heart to heart with yourself about who are you now? A lot of life happens, and it happens fast. It’s so easy to get lost in that and forget to remember who we are and recognize who we want to be.
Sometimes isolation is actually what we need for ourselves, but in this bustling world, taking that time out of our days can feel more daunting than the kumbaya with ourselves. While my husband and I were dating, he left for military training, so he was gone for about three months. I had a full-time job, but aside from that, I didn’t really have anything to fill my time if I were to be left alone for extended periods. This might sound bad about our relationship, but the independence was actually really refreshing. We had been dating so long that I didn’t know how to spend time if it wasn’t something for “we”.
When I was forced to face that question, I learned a lot about myself. Before that, I didn’t really make time for the gym. I worked 10-hour days pretty regularly, not including two twenty-minute (or longer) commutes, so I prioritized quality time with my S.O. in the time I wasn’t at work. I also took extra time to bond with my dog (we only had one at the time). My dog and I were best pals, but because of the rigor, my work schedule, my [then] boyfriend took the brunt of the responsibilities for caring for our pup. When he wasn’t there, I had to find ways to be the best dog-mom I could while still managing my work schedule. The result of this is an association with my hairdryer and playing ball that still holds today. (backstory: I would blow dry my hair standing just outside the bathroom at the end of a long hallway. I only needed one hand for the blow-dryer, so I always used my other to throw his ball to play fetch.)
At a time like this, you have to make the conscious choice to not get caught with the negative Nancie. There is always a downside to every situation but making being cognizant of your mindset can make a huge difference.
I will leave y’all with this, my favorite from the military-kid-life (and one I repeat often, just ask my husband): “When eating an elephant, take one bite at a time” (Creighton Abrams, US Army General during the Vietnam War). I love this quote because it’s a great reminder to take everything one step at a time.