In the Quiet Time of Covid Chaos

School starts tomorrow. Pushed back a week amidst the Corona virus rumblings between district and teachers. Well, district rumblings, teachers are just trying to survive.  

This  week my facebook memories are flooded with past first day of school pictures. I love first day of school pictures. I always have. The idea of a fresh new year, bright and hopeful ahead of everyone has always made me feel content.

High school Junior will be home for school. Until October the district says. I think that's optimistic. We walked out the door in March, I think we will walk back in the door in March. I am hoping for January, we shall see. 

After I get distance learning up and running here I will head to New York with college Sophomore, where we will quarantine for 14 days before moving her into an apartment. No dorms. The school pulled the plug on them two weeks ago. We pivoted into an apartment. She will join our college Senior (give or take a few units) who just moved herself across town and pivoted to adulthood with no help from us. Well, no physical help, there was some financial help. 

The irony of New York requiring me to quarantine for 14 days, to keep their declining numbers and low positivity rate is not lost on me. I was last there in March and watched them shut the city down. They had little hope. They stayed the course. I remember being grateful to fly out. Six months later I am grateful to fly in. They have plenty of hope now. 

Our oldest finished her summer session for PA school in Florida. All virtually. She has a two week break after non stop studying. I often cannot believe my girls are mine. They have qualities and a strength of character I cannot always find in myself. Watching her tackle school these last three months has been humbling. If you need a doctor in two years, find the one she is a PA for, because she is unreal in her commitment and dedication to this profession.

I have black hair, on any given day my marriage is hanging by a thread, also my marriage is stronger in ways I am beyond grateful for, I miss pedicures, I like ordering my groceries online and just picking them up behind the store, binging all kinds of TV has lost its luster, I haven't made a single decision in 5 months that I haven't second, third and fourth guessed only to have to change it by force anyway...there is a flip flopping between despair and silver linings that happens here at break necking speed. 

I share all this because I know I am not alone. I know that many will read this and nod your heads vigorously and say to yourselves, "yes, yes, me too, me too." 

In this quiet time of Covid Chaos I am trying to sit still and speak to myself. I am trying to  dig deep and find the deeper meaning. I am working hard to let go of things that weren't meant to be and reach for the things that were. It turns out when I sit still, the things I let go of weren't that important and the things I have manged to grab and move to the forefront were really the ones that mattered.

We had some peripheral life and death in our world this week. Several deaths in the lives of friends. One death that had been nearing and one that was sudden. One I had to guide myself through as an adult, and one I had to guide a daughter through. Both seemed surreal and hard and unfair. We also had life. My niece had a baby. There were some complications. All is fine now and mother and daughter are home and well. 

The pictures of mom and baby, with mom masked. The deaths being handled with masks and no opportunity to mourn with others. All happening while my face was breaking out from my minimal mask wearing and I was complaining and thinking,"If only I could have a facial again." Perspective is always handed to me in the most dramatic fashions. I would really like God to know that I am open to a dose of perspective with just a soft whisper, it does not always need to be loud.

My pastor told me today, and by me I mean he said this to everyone in his online sermon, that we can move past the things that bother us, or hurt us, or the things we said that bothered someone or hurt them. I am paraphrasing and he may read this and say, "No, no that wasn't the whole message." But, this is what I heard and this was the message I chose to pivot on and make myself feel better as I head into the fall and school year of 2020.

Tomorrow I will post our first day of school pictures. I hope everyone else does too. It is still a new year, bright and hopeful no matter what perspective had to be handed to you, or what the pivot was to get us here. 

Pivoting like a Mother F@#$*ing Whirling Dervish

My hair is brown. I paid big bucks for blonde hair  before all this went down. I loved it. But the writing is on the wall, my hair stylist isn't coming back to me any time soon, so for the price of $14.99 I now have Corona hair. It is what it is. I don't hate it.

Early on my best friend posted an article about the need to "Pivot" during this time. The need to embrace a new normal and accept what you could. I liked that a lot. I like all the P words...perseverance, perspective, pride, popcorn...you name it I like a P word. So Pivot seemed amazing to add to the list. Only now I am pivoting like a mother fucking whirling dervish right into the ground.

We currently have 8 adults and teens and three dogs living here. We won't get into the fact that I downsized two years ago and sent most of these adults and teens on their way, that was pivoted through a few weeks ago. Six of the eight of us are in some kind of school. I had to make a ZOOM chart for the house and post quiet hours. Trust me when I tell you I was mocking others for this kind of behavior and thought I was past this stage in life and over chart making shenanigans. It turns out I was not.

I'm also long term subbing for first grade. At the beginning of March I walked out the classroom door for a two week spring break like a bad ass who was going to collect easy vacation money for the last quarter of school with all lesson plans done for the year. By March 20th I was trying to get 6 and 7 year olds onto google classroom and do all work digitally from a corner in my bedroom. I'm not sure what people understand a ZOOM lesson with 6 year olds to look like, but whatever you are picturing...add more chaos and disinterest and you still won't be close. Today Steven (the names have been changed to protect the innocent) cried because I didn't "call on him" to share about Mother's Day. Well Steven, you do participate in Zoom in your bed under your covers, but, yes I will try to be better next time with spotting your raised hand under your bedspread.

The politics of it all is ridiculous and could fill a hundred blogs. The common sense that runs deep in my veins screams loud at the hypocrisy of it all. It all being people. But I have learned to pivot past that. Just quietly tending to me and my people. Focused on my own house. It's a lesson many could pivot on.

Some days I find my silver linings and I'm thriving with our big family dinners and watching the kids laugh and spend time together, other days I'm stepping over shoes not put away and wiping down the kitchen counter while muttering bad words under my breath. Some days I thrive on the silver lining of everyone is healthy and employed and functioning, other days I can't get into my first grade Zoom with ease and I am almost crying when I finally start the class. Some days I am in love with wearing joggers and black V neck T-shirts by day and jammies by night (and by "night" I mean 4pm) other days I am buying beauty products from Tori Spelling off of instagram and searching for when my botox lady might be deemed essential. Some days I have real errands to leave the house for like an online  grocery pick up or meat market purchase, other days I leave and the errands are pretend. I have no where to go but McDonald's for a large diet coke and then a quick sit in the homeless park parking lot while I catch up on the podcasts I used to listen to in the car when driving to dance and school for drop off and pick ups. 

Anyway here we are all. My story is your story, we are all pivoting, we are all trying to make it through to the other side...only really no one can see the other side.  Two months ago 38 people were dead from this thing, Today 82,000 and climbing. Projections of 147,00 by August. Irregardless we have opened the country, I mean we really have, we are, without following the guidelines originally laid out for us from CDC and then repeated by our President.. Good, bad or indifferent we are opening. Honestly? I am without an opinion on this. I see all the sides. Again, I can only do my own house, because my own house is a lot all on it's own.

So, pivot how you need to. I know some days it is graceful and other days? Like a mother Fucking whirling dervish into the ground...with your brown Corona hair flying around you.