At the end of the world, we’re all caring for sourdough starters and planting gardens and spending time on skincare. It’s not that we have so much more free time. If anything, many of us have less time. Apocalypses are time consuming.
But what can you do when your very existence is threatened and you have no control over a danger that grows larger even when you look away? Normally when we humans are in some dire circumstance, we try to find a way out. Maybe we try practical solutions and maybe we just ruminate but we can usually do at least something.
But right now, the most we can do is stay home and hope everyone else somehow has some grand epiphany and stops going to Disney World.
Faced with our mortality, which is always there but which we can normally ignore, we turn to what can nurture us and help us live. Sourdough and tomatoes and moisturizer are battles against death.
“At my back I always hear, Time’s winged chariot hurrying near.” Etc.
In the before times, I tended to buy wildly expensive skin care and then not use it so I had a lot stockpiled. Expired, sure. But what’s the worst that could happen? I’m already in the middle of a pandemic.
So I’ve been working my way through it and the trouble is that maybe some of it is working but I’m not sure what. And now that I’m running out of things, I don’t know what’s worth replacing. I should have been more scientific instead of just piling things on my face, I know.
Some other things are getting worse or maybe better but it’s hard to tell. I have a new dark spot on my nose and it feels rougher than the rest of my face. So maybe it’s skin cancer but also maybe it’s a spot that’s about to fall off and reveal youthful new skin due to some combination of Dr. Gross peel pads, P50, and retinal.
Maybe it’s just a new dark spot from the sun but believe me when I tell you that my skin has barely seen the sun since February.
Do I chance going to the dermatologist? Are dermatologists even open?
I should wear sunscreen even though I stay inside all day, huh.
The checklist of how to stay alive is long and it’s so hard to make sure everything is on it.