The King cancelled Halloween.

I was in the bathroom, putting on red lipstick and devil horns while sipping on a tequila soda when I got the notification. 

Oh. 

It was shocking, but not altogether surprising. As I slowly removed my makeup and devil horns, I texted Bryn about alternative plans. 

I quickly swapped my outfit for something more conservative and Muslim-friendly, hid my devil horns in my purse along with the bottle of tequila, cookies I made, and some American candy from the embassy, and hailed a cab to her house where we watched horror movies and ate snacks. What else was there to do but adapt?

Thus began the lesson that I would regularly unlearn and relearn with almost cyclical nausea: You cannot choose your circumstances, but you can choose how you respond. 

That night, I chose to not be subject to arrest by the Jordanian secret police for wearing a Halloween costume — not just because their headquarters was several blocks away from our duplex, but mostly because it wasn’t the hill I planned to die on. Instead, I chose to have fun with my friends and celebrate the fact that we were young, cute, and slightly drunk in the Middle East. I like to think of it as a demonstration of adaptability and resilience when faced with circumstances wildly out of my control, but all while staying 100% on brand. 

Fast forward several years, the world changed with the global spread of coronavirus. We face a crisis the magnitude the likes of which none of us have experienced. No one could have been possibly prepared, but my life stayed remarkably familiar. 

Only, I’m not in a developing nation anymore. I’m in America. I’m “home”. 

And it’s weird. Our newest ‘rona reality has forced me to reevaluate the American touchstones and habits I’ve developed while living here. I’m relearning what it’s like to have to be adaptable and resilient in the face of circumstances that are consistently and wildly out of my control. All while in the United States of America, land of the free, home of the brave. 

When considering life under American quarantine, I initially had high expectations for myself. Surely, a life of post-communist dictatorships, filthy Aeroflot and Air Garuda flights, and navigating digital friendships have uniquely prepared me for a global pandemic. After being routinely hit so hard with circumstances outside of my control with 15 years overseas, I believed I would have retained a sense of buoyancy. Rise above. Bounce back. Unreliable information from the government, only being able to video chat with friends, and crappy grocery stores with empty shelves and single-ply toilet paper are par for the course at this point. 

Spoiler alert: I failed every single smugly-set expectation I had for myself.

When it comes to coping with COVID-19, it’s been sucky. Adaptability and resiliency don’t rise to the top immediately — it’s not like a curds and whey situation, even with a decade of dealing with unexpected circumstances. Because I’m still mad. I was mad then, and I’m mad now. There’s a lot of anger. Anger is an enormously valid and important response that ignites action and demands acknowledgment. If trauma begets trauma, coronavirus is exacerbating the mourning and grief that’s already lying there, blistered and pulsating. 

What goes unacknowledged in the think-pieces and listicles is that children who claim the title of Third Culture Kid have lives a-washed with grief from unerring, unrelenting change. We move like rolling stones through embassies, military bases, and new international schools. We mourn the things we’ve lost and flown away from. We’ve had to navigate through trauma without being subsumed by it, simply because we’ve had no other choice. Life, as we once knew it, is gone. Over and over and over. 

And maybe that’s why COVID-19 feels so achingly familiar. 

It’s uncanny, I’m seeing my life 10 to 15 years ago happen all over again. My parents are relying on private networks of information, because the national government is untrustworthy and the federal leader is an outright liar. And that despite the leader’s best efforts and strongman tactics, there’s an eerie unreliability on what will happen tomorrow. There’s no national sense of order. The ground shifted from beneath us without sufficient warning, so now we live in the ebbs and flows of cultural instability. I can’t reliably get chocolate chips or yeast again. 

I can’t be alone in this. Surely, the isolation, scarcity and sanctions of COVID-19 life are triggering similar memories and responses in others — refugees, people from conflict zones, others that spent significant time in developing nations. I thought I could move on, fly away, have it be different somewhere else, but I guess I can’t. Quasi-authoritarian leaders, picked-through grocery stores, playing “gunshot or firework”, checkpoints, and strangers being nosy about my health status isn’t anything new for me. Now, it’s just happening in America.

And the deja-vu qualities of my COVID-19 experience in America has left me feeling whiplashed, like a ping pong ball ricocheting off of long-forgotten coping mechanisms, evidence of cultural neuroplasticity, and old recipes to dupe restaurant classics. Because it feels like I’ve been here before — it’s the anticipatory grief of what’s to come. 

Undoubtedly, our toughest days lie ahead. There will be boredom, anxiety, unfinished projects, high aspirations, loneliness, sickness and sorrow. But the loss of little American luxuries like Charmin Ultra Strong toilet paper and going outside without being subject to citation isn’t as debilitating as I thought it was going to be. I know that life is going to move on without me, no matter how much I kick and scream about it. So, I find choose to find comfort in the stalwart and true.

So, when everything’s changed, what’s remained the same?

Hogwarts will always be there to welcome you home. 

You will always be able to find Coca-Cola. 

Generally, it’s probably as bad as you think it is, but certainly not as bad as you feel it is. 

Fucking with boys can’t cook or don’t have books in their bedroom is a bad idea. They are not to be relied on for serotonin, even as a treat. (Still learning this one.)

You cannot choose your circumstances, but you can choose how you respond. 

Therefore, if you think you hate everyone, take a bath and eat a snack. And if you think everyone hates you, take a bath and go to bed. 

The Perks of Being a Wallflower was right. Things change. And friends leave. Life doesn’t stop for anybody.