Social
Distancing
BY JUDY ERON
10 Cenizo Summer 2020
In 1993, in the middle of our lives, we
moved to the Big Bend area, attracted by the
remoteness of this wild and magnificent
desert. It was a place we would be able to
enjoy solitude beyond anything we had
experienced elsewhere. We would be able to
isolate ourselves, to be distant from others, to
feel the exhilaration of being alone, with only
occasional times going out to perform music.
As the years rolled by, we purchased more
and more surrounding land to ensure
separation. What joy to be able to look out for
miles and see no one.
Our friends could not grasp such a choice,
such a move. “Why would you want to remove
yourselves from your friends?
Why would you want to be so
far from everything? What is
there to do out there?” It was
beyond their understanding
or experience, and they just
shook their heads. To choose
to live so distant from others
just made no sense to them.
How ironic, then, that now,
years later, everyone is being
instructed to isolate
themselves, encouraged to
keep distance between
themselves and others. Six
feet of distance specifically. This virus has
spread in such a way that keeping distance
from others is recommended as one of the
primary ways to ensure safety. “Keep your six
feet of distance.”
What a laugh. We live our lives, and have
lived our lives for almost 30 years, with more
like six MILES of distance. There is no one to
keep six feet of distance from.
Now our friends, to a person. are nodding
their heads and saying, “You are in about the
safest place you can be during this pandemic.”
They envy that we can go out and walk or hike
for hours with no need to wear a mask, no
danger of coming into contact with anyone.
No chance of coming into contact with
anything that anyone else has touched that
might transmit the virus.
Life, and its twists and turns . . .
Social distancing is not a hardship for so
many of us who live here. It is the reason we
moved here, that quest for more personal
Social distancing
is not a hardship
for so many of us
who live here. It is
the reason we
moved here, that
quest for more
personal space.
space. There are people who are here because
they very much needed to get distant from
others, those who struggle with challenges
from mental illness, those whose conception
of the world differs greatly from the
mainstream, those who have had a hard time
getting along with others, always ending up
with misunderstandings they could not
negotiate or resolve. And there are many
artists, musicians and writers whose creative
self requires the abundant solitude inherent
in living here.
To choose to live out here takes a certain
type of person, one who does not require a lot
of social interaction, one who can find
meaningful ways to spend
their days without any
imposed outside structure.
As it turns out, it was great
preparation for living
through this pandemic, for
abiding the restrictions of
social distancing. Many of
our friends who live in
populated areas are restless
and bored, having difficulty
finding things to do as they
are in this time of enforced
separateness, being home,
even afraid to take the risk of
a walk.
Charlie and I are retired, so we are not
suffering from the economics of this virus as
millions of people are. We do not have to
worry about childcare, as so many who are
working from home do. We have plenty of
things to fill our time. We do miss performing
our music in public as we have done for years
and years, but we play together in the house.
And I do sometimes stand in front of my closet
and look at my lonely little cowgirl shirts I
wear for performing, just hanging there with
nowhere to go.
Things are loosening a bit now, restrictions
lifting in an effort to return people to their
jobs, to halt the hemorrhaging of the economy.
Hopefully people will continue to follow
protocols for staying safe. We on this remote
mountain desert are continuing to do what we
do well – social distancing—but now, at last
and without even trying, we are right in step
with the rest of the world.