By: JANA GREENE

One of my favorite episodes of The Golden Girls is the one titled, “The Flu.” The premise is that all the ladies are attending a banquet, where one of them will win the “Best Friend of the Friends of Good Health” award. In sitcoms, chaos often ensues, but is resolved by peals of laughter within the 30-minute run-time, which would be damn handy in real life. Amirite?

Over the course of the past five years, I’ve thought of this episode a bunch. Those Golden Girls always seemed to be forever attending banquets and award ceremonies. I am the age they were, and nary one banquet have I attended. Also, I am certain I would win any friendship awards, period. Several times, I have felt like a candidate for “The Worst Friend of the Friends (“Chaos and Mayhem Chapter.”)

It started with the pandemic. Remember watching Tiger King? I swore was the most unhinged thing ever, (can you believe this guy? ) Little did we know there would be a shift, the likes of which we have never seen. Little did we know, Tiger King was actually the LEAST unhinged thing coming.

The next four years are a blur of pure madness, and for me personally, a diagnosis of leukemia. Because my body does not give a single *&%$ that I was already overwhelmed.

And The Madness we have been living through have affected us all. The political landscape leveled by the scorched earth policies of this administration have divided us in ways we never knew were possible. It’s a red-letter day when I get out of my pajamas, y’all. I’m owning my depression and anxiety.

I used to have boundless energy to nurture friendships and be the best friend I can be. Checking in on my friends, reminding them how cherished they are, and – on occasion – leaving the actual house to see them. The truth is that I care SO much that I’m sort of paralyzed.

We live in the Upside Down now, our little corner of purgatory. Not to be dramatic, but it’s been the worst.

Mentally, it’s like being at the circus for years, with no way out of the tent; scary clowns running amok, wild animals uncaged, terrifying trumpets and trombones, and where the hell is the exit? I am hanging on by a sequined thread of hope somehow.

Because it’s the worst, so am I, on occasion. Or that’s how it feels. Maybe that’s how you feel too. You very much want to be the person you were pre-pandemic. You very much want all of your friendships to thrive, but all you have the energy for is a box of Oreos and doom-scrolling. The struggle is real.

I so badly want to be a truly good friend. I’m so blessed by my chosen family. But the only award I’m up for is “The Best Friend of the Friends of Shitty Health,” or maybe “Friend Most Likely to Dissociate for Long Periods of Time.”

In a way – like the Golden Girls – we all have a “Flu” right now. And we have for years, at this point. We are all operating from a place of “caring fatigue.” It’s a real hard time to be an empath, absorbing everyone else’s energy.

We are all experiencing the achiness of division, the headache of existing in a world so harsh. We are all infirm right now. We were not created for the onslaught of global information, or the over-saturation of horribleness. Our connectedness is in peril. The clarity of those of us seeing through the veil can be a hinderance.

I long to be the friend I was before all of this (*gestures wildly.*) None of us have been this way before, and it’s a real intense pilgrimage to feel deeply.

IMBD sums up the Flu episode thus: “Blanche, Dorothy and Rose all come down with the flu and infuriate each other. When they each suspect that one of them has won a major award for their charity work, their competitiveness causes them all to attend despite their illness.”

At the conclusion, Blanche, Dorothy, and Rose – all who were expecting to win the Best Friends award – are not the winners. Dorothy’s mother, the Queen of Snark, Sophia, takes the prize. But in the end – as sitcom rules dictate – all of the girls come to the conclusion that the award is not the accolade, but their actual friendships that matter most.

I hope we all come out of this mess realizing the same.