It’s been a while since I’ve had a change to get an update into words. Things have changed, but much has remained the same.
Deaths and confirmed COVID-19 cases have increased, but we haven’t seen the overwhelmed hospitals that everyone was fearing. There’s been over 20k deaths in the USA but most feel that the numbers are under-counted due to lack of testing and other factors.
For us in our community, not much has changed. Our family continues to remain at home other than grocery runs and the occasional pizza or hike. We’ve scheduled grocery pick up orders to minimize our time in the store as much as possible.
I definitely miss being out. Right now, all the tree buds are breaking, and that’s one of my favorite times of year. I always enjoy seeing the sheen of color as tree buds swell and leaves emerge across the hillsides.
Our kids seem to be ok, although they have good days and not as good days. It’s hard to tell if they seem to like having more freedom or a more structured schedule. We’re accomplishing some school work, but it depends on the day, and the kid, as to how school goes.
It seems like our days are still just as busy, but just with different activities. Normally, it would be off to school for the big kids, then soccer or ballet or swim class after school, homework, dinner, bath, and bed. For me, I would start work at 8am, leave around 9am, be home by 4:30pm, then be back to start the evening schedule. Weekends would have soccer on Saturdays, then other family plans, work on the farm, some travel, and yard work. Now, the schedule is fixed: kids are up between 7 and 8am, they have some school, some TV. I still start work at 8am, just don’t leave the house. Lunch is at noon for me, the kids get food whenever. Mom gets a walk in some days after the kids are fed. If it’s nice out, they’ll play outside, which helps mom get a bit of a break. I’m at work until 4:30pm, then try to do something with the kids to give mom a break. Then it’s dinner, bed, and baths, just to do it all over again. If we do get in the occasional outing, it’s out for a hike or maybe bike rides.
There was an interesting article circulating this week that talked about the coming gaslighting; that everyone from the federal government to mass marketing is going to try to get everyone to forget what happened and move on when we’re back to “normal”.
There’s a couple of views on this. First, most are projecting that there’ll not really be a “normal” in the sense that everything will go back as it was. It’ll be 12-18 months before we are really out and about. We probably won’t shake hands as much. No one is really sure how the economic situation is really going to play out; hopefully we can bounce back fairly soon but it’s too soon to project that. Then, do we really want all the hustle and bustle of old? Many have commented on how this has been a relief from dashing here and there, constantly on the go. Even my wife, before all this happened, would occasionally comment that we were too busy, that we had too much on our calendar.
Now, I have enjoyed some of the moments. It’s been great to take my kids to our family farm more, not to work but just to explore. I’m enjoying sitting next to my four year old right now as she colors while I type. If we were in the “normal” times before COVID, we would right now probably be chasing the kids around the lawn at church for a post-worship Easter egg hunt, the off to lunch at one grandparent’s house, with dinner likely scheduled at the other grandparent’s house.
Instead, we’re hanging out at home. My wife and I just watched a choppy church service livestream. We may try to get dressed in nice clothes sometime today to go outside for a photo, perhaps outside at her parents while Nana and Pop watch at a safe distance. We do have a ham for dinner, but it won’t be the same as Grammy’s ham and full spread to go along with it.
I’ll be ready to go back to “normal” – whatever that looks like. It’s not going to be the same as old normal, but it’ll be something. That said, I don’t want to rush or gloss over the staggering losses that some are feeling or fighting through, whether medical, financial, or even emotional, including the potential loss of a loved one. While we still haven’t seen direct affects here in our small community, the church livestream (from a larger metro area) mentioned several fighting COVID in the prayer requests, including some on ventilators, one of which was a youth.
The other issues that has been highlighted in this crisis is the underlying economic inbalance that exists in the USA. That is, those who can afford to stay at home have been, and are less likely to contract COVID, while those who have to work are more likely to be at work, and at greater risk and have been contracting COVID at greater percentages that the former group. We have seen that the group who has to work, especially minorities, are at much higher risk to get sick, and this includes that they may be less healthy than others due to their inability to have better jobs, and those jobs they have don’t provide adequate health insurance, and problems are compounded from there. Hopefully on the other side of this, our country has a major change of opinion on how we all receive health insurance, and comes to the realization that more people on a centralized or semi-centralized system will likely result in healthier populations and lower health care costs for us all.
This has rambled on a bit, but overall the message remains steady: stay at home. Things will get better eventually.
CanalSide 