Being a person who identifies as a writer I felt it would be prudent to write something about this sheltering in place and the slow melting of liberties previously believed to have been given to us by God. Though it seems that was all lip service and it is the government that gives them too us. The Gov giveth and taketh away. ## I am not going to do that. I will not sit and pound out 300 to 800 words about all of these fears and emotions that I am tempted to express, so that I can make other people feel less alone. You are alone[1](#fn-1) unless you are not in which case you might need to be social distancing. I have been finishing up a book by A.W. Tozer. He usually has such a poetic and joyful disposition in his writing but “Man The Dwelling Place of God” does not have this tone. In fact, he can comes off downright angry in some parts and extremely critical in others. Yet I find myself not being able to put up a defense of his critique[2](#fn-2). He writes, closer to the end of the book, that a good teacher is not someone that just photocopies the ideas they are teaching, wholesale into the minds of their students. What they do is guide them through the ideas and help the student see the natural wonders along the way. The same is said of good writers they don’t expound their ideas simply decimating them but they help the reader see the idea. They point it out on the journey and let the reader think about those ideas. I would not be finishing up this book if it weren’t for this shelter in place stuff. ## Noise The profound jabbering of our world is truly a sight to behold. We have tooled the internet to generate an awful din so that we might not stop and think[3](#fn-3). A single man could start his day with a podcast, followed by his favorite rapper, then off to work while he listens to yet another news podcast. After all that constant music can be pumped into the ears. This process is broken up with the occasional Youtube or Facebook video. Nevermind going to the bathroom without his device. Then once work is done the TV can be turned on and all other responsibilities and people ignored. Then you can retire to your room where the TV or your phone can lull you to sleep. It is all so easy. So very easy. Yet I have found another way in all of this corona panic. In the morning, I get out of bed and read a single bible verse. I take this verse into the shower with me and I think about it. Then I get out and go for a walk around my neighborhood. I come back and read and journal. This was not possible before the quarantine. I had places I needed to be and pressing schedules. Now I just come home from my walk and get started at work[4](#fn-4). In this time of mess and mayhem, I think I might have somehow found a vacation[5](#fn-5). * * * 1. I don’t want to flatten the scope of alone. Plenty of people exist in some state of aloneness. I mostly wanted the sharpness of the statement to be amusing. In the same way, this footnote panders to my better nature and does not want those that would feel more alone because I flattened the scope of aloneness to feel that way.[↩](#fnref-1) 2. I won’t be writing about that either.[↩](#fnref-2) 3. Imagine you are in a room alone. No sound, no music, no people, just you and your thoughts. Now imagine you were okay with that. Imagine no one ever knew what you thought about in that room alone because you did not write a blog post about it and post it to your blog for no one to read.[↩](#fnref-3) 4. I get started early! Like a whole hour earlier than I would If I was commuting. I don’t even mind.[↩](#fnref-4) 5. **A.W. Tozer Quotes:** The mind should be an eye to see with rather than a bin to store facts in. The best book does not merely inform the reader but stirs them to inform themselves.[↩](#fnref-5)