The New Normal

On March 19th, California was ordered into a lockdown.

But due to getting conjunctivitis the week before this lockdown, I have only been outside the house for 7 days since March 1st. It is now April 11th.

Even before his official declaration, we, as a family, had decided to severely limit where we went to only where we had to go, because both Grace and I are at higher risk with the coronavirus.

But for the sake of posterity, let it be stated that the majority of the United States, and the world, really, are closed due to this intense pandemic sweeping the globe. It hits some people mildly, and others dangerously, and has killed many. But most importantly, it is extremely contagious, and so, everything is closed.

School takes place at home, with distance learning with the teachers on the computer. Hockey practices are mostly us reminding him to practice at home, with occasional zoom video conferencing lessons.

Our days, nights and weekends are all spent at home, with only Blake venturing outside the house.

For anyone who knows us, you know this is extremely rare and out of character for us. We were the family always out the door somewhere. Remington was on several hockey teams, and loved it. He loved the practices and the games, and looked forward to both. Grace was enjoying parkour, tumbling and had recently added a trampoline class and soccer to the mix.

Weekends too were filled, with even more than just sports. We had farmer's market and gatherings with friends, church and breakfast with my parents. It was good, but it was undeniably busy. My planner, though fun to do, was necessary to keep track of all of the different activities that filled our lives.

Going cold turkey from this life to home, all the time, was a shock to the system.

We had time we didn't know what to do with, genuinely, because we hadn't had that time before. Instead of weekends filled with plans, we had large gaps of time to fill, and I think that the absence of all of our normal activities was still so fresh, so new, that it hurt to not have them, like a still open wound.

But now, as we approach a month with this reality as a family, and I am over a month, it is interesting to see the change in our collective mindsets.

It had gotten to the point that toys were only occasionally played with at home, because we were home for so little of the day, and by the time we finished everything it was time for dinner and bed, and maybe a family show to relax with together.

With an excess of time, both kids are back into toys in a major way. Grace has been combining her LOL dolls with the castle blocks to make homes and schools for her dolls, and I overhear elaborate stories with them. Remington is not only building with Legos (which he never stopped before) but is also bringing back out his super heros for adventures, and joining Grace in her imaginative play with her dolls and Legos.

The basketball hoop on our garage was there when we moved in, and yet it was played with only occasionally. But now games are at minimum nightly, and several times a day on the weekends.

We have time for more family games at night, because I can start dinner earlier without the sports, and then there are more hours before bed to get more activities in.

Personally, though I have always loved baking, it is a time consuming activity, that I never had time for before. It was difficult to squeeze in an occasional baked good here or there ever since the kids got old enough to do the sports life.

All this to say that although it is undeniable that being quarantined is life changing, I can't say that it is a fully negative thing in our lives anymore.

Obviously, I don't mean to say that the virus is good by any means, and it is truly a tragedy how many people have lost their lives and their loved ones to it. My heart goes out to all of the hospital workers and researchers who are working tirelessly to help the world beat it.

Our little family definitely has the hard parts too, like having to do school at home.

It is a challenging time, and I know it will feel good to get back to something more like the life we lived before. But I hope that not all of it disappears. I hope that I can continue to bake, at least more than I used to before COVID-19. I hope that my kids can find time to play between whatever activities resume, at some point. I'm glad they can play basketball together.

I never thought I would live through an historical event like this, and I supposed no one ever really expects to. This is as close as I have ever come before to things like the rationing of WW2. It is a really unique experience to not be able to easily and without fail get whatever food I think of, or that my family wants.

But that is what got me back into baking. I was having trouble ordering bread, so I decided I could make it. When I searched for yeast, I quickly learned that was out of stock too. But I was able to get a sourdough starter, and it sparked a really fun new hobby that my entire family has enjoyed.

Even flour was a struggle, so I found a milling company, off Amazon, and ordered 100lb of flour, so that I don't have to worry if I have enough flour to make recipes for my family now.

All of this started with the lack of already made bread.

It is amazing how quickly life can get boiled down to the essentials, the things that were present 40, 50, 60 years ago when your nation and world are going through a major event like this. Breadmaking, music, basketball, dolls, and action figures. Not that we don't have and use technology daily, but I do try to limit it, and I think we are all better off for it.

I even attempted homemade cinnamon rolls today for tomorrow morning. It was a recipe that not only would I never have attempted in the past, I literally wouldn't have had time to make it. This recipe required something from me starting from around 10 am this morning, off and on all day and evening, and then again tomorrow morning. If we had hockey and our normal Saturday, I couldn't babysit dough all day. But it has been an adventure that I hope has a tasty conclusion tomorrow.

I hope, as a nation, that we come out as stronger people when it is all over. Forced to spend more time than we perhaps wanted to at home, forced to grow closer to those we live with or to learn more about ourselves, maybe there will be a positive change in the generation that lives through the coronavirus pandemic of 2020.

And as for me, I hope that I keep my little starter sourdough alive even when quarantine is over, too.

p.s. I could have put this on Medium, but I would have needed to polish it more, and leave a lot of the boring, over personal parts out. I wanted a stream of consciousness post, to commemorate this weirdly unique time of life that everyone is going through right now. So I came back to my little old personal blog.

Living Through a Historical Moment in the Making

I have written a number of things on my Medium website about coronavirus.

March 1st- My Family Takes the Coronavirus Threat Seriously

March 6th- A Logic Based Guide to Why Testing for the Coronavirus is Crucial

March 10th- Dear Americans, Please Stop Politicizing a Global Threat

March 15th- Am I a Covid-19 Cylon? Are you?

But I wanted a personal one. No one is likely to care what I say here, but I needed to process my feelings through writing, even if no one will care to read it.

I love planning.

I have one of those fancy planners with stickers and everything, and it helps me keep track of the many activities that my kids have on a typical week.

This week is anything but typical.

Usually we would have school, followed by rink time, hockey practices, soccer practices, and games for both.

Not this week.

This week everything is closed, and it is surreal to live through a time where for the safety of the public EVERYTHING is getting canceled. A week where the news, Twitter, and everyone online says it is time to stay home, social distance, keep the virus from spreading.

These are scenes from a movie, not real life.

Yet it is real.

What is worse is that my state, California, is in the thick of it, with the third highest confirmed numbers of the States, meaning that the true numbers are exponentially higher. We hear the reports coming from Italy, which is running about 10 days ahead of us, and their hospitals are overrun. They are choosing who gets to live based on bedspace/ ventilators, and warning that we will have the same problem if we aren't careful.

The governor here has said that he will be taking over hotels as hospitals when it comes to that. Which if Italy is any indicator, it probably will.

I'm nervous for Grace, as she has a compromised immune system, and under normal circumstances she has to be hospitalized for regular fevers.

Even if she can avoid the bad virus, I'm afraid if she gets a regular virus during these strange times. A regular virus that usually gets her time in the hospital, an anti-bacterial shot and monitoring. Will there be a place for her to go?

I feel lost. All the time.

There is no way to prepare for an outbreak. But it is here. In my area, in my state, in my country. This is not a foreign virus, this is a virus very much here.

Every day we see the numbers grow. Every day the news tells us how we haven't tested enough and our true numbers are exponentially higher. So I am rightfully concerned about literally every person we come in contact with. I want to limit all interactions with the outside world. Which is what they tell us anyways, so my family is hunkering down and trying to find a balance with still living life, having fun while going nowhere that other people are.

It is strange.

Someday books and movies will be made about the coronavirus pandemic of 2020, and they will know how long it lasts, and how it ends. But not us. We are living through it, and the unknown is scary.

The odds are that by the end of it, we will all know someone who is affected by the coronavirus, either by getting sick or dying to it. It is a weird thought. I don't want it to affect my small world.

But it probably will, like it or not.

Someday my grandkids might ask me what it was like living through the coronavirus pandemic.

My current thoughts are that it is scary, surrreal, and unsettling. It is a poignant reminder that we live in a world where bad things can happen, even if we usually ignore that reality. If a pandemic can happen, what else is possible? I know our nation will get through it, but I think the scars the fear will leave will last even after the worst of the pandemic is past.