Entering Coronavirus Mode
The current global pandemic of COVID-19 has really crept up on us. It started as whispered warnings from afar, and only a few people actually paid attention. Now it’s right in front of our faces. High Water Fest is cancelled. The Pour House is closed. Every musician everywhere has cancelled all of their upcoming gigs and tours. Every event in general is just cancelled by default.
You don’t need to come to Extra Chill to get this information. You can go to any news outlet anywhere and they are probably doing a better job than we could ever hope to. So we’re not even going to try. See the Post & Courier or the NY Times to find out what’s going on with this virus.
What we do have here at Extra Chill, though, is a little sense of community. Most people who read this website are the people that you’d see at places like the Royal American or the Pour House. A lot of you probably know each other, and some of you might even know me. How’s everybody doing? I’m alright over here.
We’re all feeling this collective pumping of the brakes. Life has taken a pause while we wait and see what’s going to happen. In the meantime, we’ve got to adjust to this sudden new reality, however temporary we hope it will be.
As is true with just about everything, Extra Chill is going to shift away from its regularly scheduled programming and enter into what we’re calling “Coronavirus Mode”. We want the creative community to continue to thrive through all this, and Extra Chill plans to do everything it can to help make sure that happens. We’re still going to cover new music, but since there are no events to promote in tandem with the music, the releases are bound to slow down as well. Unless…
This presents us with an interesting problem. There is not much to cover, but there is an extremely abundant amount of time to write. For that reason we’re going to keep the factory rolling, but in a different way. What that different way is has yet to be determined. We will figure it out as we go.
That’s really the silver lining in all this COVID-19 frenzy: We all now have a lot of free time that we did not have before. Forget about the lack of work and the lack of money and the lack of a social life for now. There’s not much you can really do about that, so shift your focus to something else. You have the golden blessing of the one thing that everybody wishes they had more of: Time.
Assuming you and everybody in your household stays healthy, how you choose to spend your time is up to you. It is very easy to freak out if you think too hard about the uncertainty of the future. The word coming out of the media is going to be scary for a while. There is no telling what is going to be the result or aftermath of this virus. Those are facts.
But remember, you always have yourself, and you also have all this time with no obligations. That is the dream of every creative person everywhere.
I know everybody reading this has at least one thing that they can do at home that they’ve always wanted to do, or have been meaning to finish, but life got in the way. Well, guess what? Life just stepped out of the way. Go do that thing. Get so involved in it that you lose track of time for a while. Put aside any useless distractions and just dive into your creative spirit. Who knows what you might come up with? I’m sure you have an idea of what it might be for you.
Maybe you’ll get high and rearrange the house. Maybe you’ll finally pull the weeds from your garden. Maybe you’ll write some music, or maybe you’ll just get drunk and play the guitar. Maybe you’ll even finish that novel.
Whatever you decide to do with your time, the point at the bottom of it is to keep your mental health in check. We’re all trying to figure out how to navigate the world on a daily basis, and that can be hard enough in itself. This extra variable makes it more complicated, but maybe it doesn’t have to be. Maybe the whole world really does need a break.
That’s enough from Extra Chill for the day. We love everybody who reads this website, and we hope you’re all staying healthy, both physically and mentally. You’ll be hearing from us soon. Peace!
P.S. – Feel free to hit me up with any ideas. Contact page is here.