And just like that, everything has changed.
Back in 2009, I wrote this entry entitled "Love in the Time of Swine Flu," expressing my frustration that that virus caught the country so ill-prepared that we were actually running out of vaccines. Oh, sweet summer child, me.
It was the weekend of March 14th, 2020 that our world came crashing down. I don't think I'll ever forget it. As I have told friends, it was like watching your house burn down. After a certain point, you know it's doomed, that it's all coming down. But you still watch. You mourn every separate room that the fire consumes.
In January, Coronavirus looked like a really sad and scary problem the Chinese were having. In February, Coronavirus looked like something that might affect a few West Coast areas.
But in March, first the local school musical was cancelled, then Miles' field trip. At the same time, both Jon's university and mine switched to online classes only for the rest of the semester. It looked like necessary precautions to take at places with such large gatherings, but surely, I thought, they wouldn't close schools. Surely we could still see our friends. Surely we could still see our relatives, as long as everyone's hand hygiene was tip-top. Then the building combusted.
We got the call on Saturday afternoon that public schools would be closed. I was trying to nap, sleeping off a bad night with Joni and looking forward that night to my first evening out with friends since having her. I blearily picked up the phone and heard the bad news, then rolled over, feeling bleak. I was tired enough that I still managed a nap, but it wasn't long after I woke that my friends and I conferred and we decided we'd better cancel. I was disappointed. I'm glad, looking back, that I didn't realize then how long it would likely be before I'd be able to see any of those people again.
On Sunday, I learned my co-workers at RIT would be continuing the semester working from home. All the various locations around town where I would want to bring the children while they were out of school were closing, all museums and playgrounds and public events. We went to what we learned would be the last church service for an indefinite period.
On Tuesday, Jon learned he, too, would be working from home. On Wednesday, the unthinkable happened: the public library closed.
Tuesday the 17th was St. Patrick's Day. It was also my 6 week postpartum visit, which was conducted over the phone that day. I had already failed the postpartum depression evaluation I took at Joni's 2 week appointment. Needless to say, I failed the six week one too. I don't know that I've ever been as low as I was in March, 2020.
We're working on it.
In the meantime. we're digging inside ourselves for some personal strength we didn't know we had to keep ourselves mentally, physically, and emotionally healthy during this time. I never intended to be a homeschool mom, or even a stay-at-home mom, but here we are. For the sake of our sanity, we keep a schedule, with academic time in the morning, creative time after that. We balance school with play with outdoor time and social time on Messenger Kids, Marco Polo, and Zoom/Google Hangouts. There's a white board, and a quote of the week.
Jon puts his work schedule at the top. This is our family's anchor, reminding us that we're in this together.
The kids got their chromebooks from school and we now spend the mornings keeping up with school work and class meetings, while entertaining Joni between her naps:
We are now a puzzle family:
We keep up with Dad and Agnes and Mercedes, as well as with the Grunert Grandparents, over Facetime:
Every week, we take a family outing to an outdoor park (sans playground). Thank God for the Ergo carrier!
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| At Mendon Ponds |
And every day I listen to Governor Cuomo's press conferences like they're Fireside Chats in the Great Depression. He's like my weighted blanket lately, reminding me that some leaders will listen to experts, some leaders have a plan, some leaders... can lead.
Also, the Facebook comments are always good value:
We try to help keep up our neighbors' spirits with the bear and the rainbow in the window. On one of our daily sanity walks with the dog and the baby, Jon and I found a St. Francis statue someone had left at the foot of their lawn labeled "free."
Frankie lives with us, now.
We chalk the driveway to spread hope and cheer:
And Joni grows...
and grows.
Her two-month appointment was on Good Friday. Fittingly, it was a horrifying experience. I had to go alone with her, everyone (including me) was wearing a mask, and she screamed after her vaccinations like she never has. She was frothing and unwilling to eat or sleep for a couple of hours. I had to drive her home in that state, with the news all around me that Coronavirus would likely be part of our lives until there is a vaccine in 12-18 months. I wondered if I would ever work again, see my friends again, hug my father again. It was an appropriately miserable day.
We're all learning to metabolize so much grief, fear, disappointment. We've found that what you have to do is to take care of your body, and keep up a steady stream of whatever you can find to give you joy. Easter found us again dyeing chicken eggs on Holy Saturday, and gathering around a Vigil fire. It was our fire, in our yard. But it was Holy, all the same, and we read the Great Vigil words together.
Easter Sunday found us hunting for plastic eggs in the grass. It was our grass, and we hid them ourselves, but the kids still took the campaign very seriously.
On Easter Sunday, Dad and Agnes watched the egg hunt from a distance in our yard. It was hard.
But they-- and we-- are learning to make do. The difficulty level of our lives has been turned up, but we're leveling up.
I don't want to give the impression that I think the pandemic begins and ends with the way it affects our family. Far from it. My mind is constantly flooded with worry and fear for a world of suffering people. I hate all of it, from the kids having to miss their concerts and special events to the lonely grandparents, to the people who've lost their jobs already or will in the coming months, to those that are losing family members, to those who are dying alone in hospitals across the world. This is a time for intercessory prayer if there ever was such a time, and it's a time to magnify the reach of whatever love we're able to propagate into humanity. I don't know if we've all ever needed each other so much.
Side note: isn't it awesome that dogs and babies most likely have no idea that anything is amiss?
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