Good Lifestyle

Collin and I met on a New York roof at the end of August of last year, a moment when we were all take for outdoor learning. He was his birthday party and I planted. The air was thick and soft, the type of moisture that makes thousands of New Yorkers flock towards the seaside cities of Long Island and in New Jersey on weekends.

"I'm about to finish a bookOctavia Spencer"," Said Collin, after I told him that I liked to read.

"Do you mean Butler? »

"Oh yes, I meantOctavia Butler. Octavia Spencer is an actress. He was embarrassed by the error. A brilliance infused wine developed under his neck, a small ripple in his confident general attitude.

For months after, we were turning on each other, never qualifying what we were doing as "dating". We were, after all, new in New York and adulthood, eachrelations which made us wish never to be in a new one. Yet we started to spend all our time together.

We quickly found ourselves at a Ramen place near the Collin apartment. This was our first real "date". We sat there to speak long after our plates were erased, realizing what was going on between us, but completely ignorant that it would also be our last date for months. We bought concert tickets for shows in March and April and seasonal packages to our favorite cinema. We have planned a summer together, not knowing thatcoronavirus soon interrupt the euphoria of ournew relationship.

In mid-March, the recommendation of my work, Istarted working at home In my small apartment of Brooklyn. Even though we were sequestered in our respective spaces, Collin and I werecommitted to seeing each other. It was before we can really see the cloud that is on top. There were mixed signals everywhere, we did not know what thenecessary precautions were. One day, we took the metro to a record store and explore the album lines for the hours and the other, we were locked in a room, looking at the rotation turn disk and spin.

After days oftroubling news alerts, I called my mother. I grew up in a suburb outside of New York and, afraid of what was going to come, we organized for her to come and get me later that day. I left the city thinking that I would not be away for a weekend to recalibrate. Collin and I do not even carve along distance plan Because we did not think the situation required it.

Later that night, nestled in my childhood bed, I called it. He told me he was considering going home to TEXAS wait for theClimbing situation in New York. "I really want to go out of here," he said. "I mean, you are not here and the cheap flight is so for tomorrow. I would feel safer. In the morning, he stole halfway across the country. Just a day before, we were sitting next to each other on the couch, taking our physical proximity for granted, and we did not know when we would see each other again.

Collin and I both beware ofLong distance relationships. I was the one who finished lamentably when I went abroad in Scotland while dating my college boyfriend. Our faces became a life buoy for me in a foreign city, so I began to miss because I was attached to someone in states. Collin, meanwhile, dates from his high school girlfriend for a few years during college and felt like he had not been fully present.

Yet we said, it was different. This situation was not the one we could control and we had to adapt.

I did not know if we should put the basic rules.Should we face every day? Call? What about SMS sending? Does not get to get our job and try to focus? But when things grew up, instead of wanting to talk to anyone, I found myselfExcessive consumption of observationKing tigerAll weekend in the comfort of my child's room and looking at the ceiling. Collin also went through something similar. When we talked about it, we mainly deplored our inability to do anything useful, at a timeworried about the current situationAt New York.

Over the past days, I started to ask me:How can you give someone else whenTaking care of you is so difficult?

But, I quickly learned that the answer to this question isCommunication and comfort. Collin and I decided it's ok to take a day at some point the current crisis. If we do not face it or call one day, it's ok too. If one of usneed time for us, We say, and if one of us needs to speak, even if just to hear a "I love you", we jump on the phone.

We also slowly formed other rituals and more habits we are separated. In the evening we're goingstart a movie at the same timeand text throughout. It almost looks like sitting next to each other and whispering. Of course, having a screen between us feels different than being together, but our foundation has always been our shared introversibility and our love for art in its many forms. The only thing missing is the physical touch, which is definitely my love language - but since our relationship on our common interests we can alwaysRecommend books, music and movies to each other with the same fervor we did when we were together.

Before you fall asleep every night, I think of what it will be as will meet with Collin. I do not have a date or season in mind. This could be weeks or months. Yet at the very least we can planWhich movie watch together the next day. And for the moment, that's enough.

And for more things about how to handle your relationship in quarantine, check9 relationship councils for quarantine couples, according to an expert.

Bel Banta lives in Brooklyn and works in the publication of books.