Second Month Locked Down

This week feels new. It's week five, after four that really were a smudgy blur. The boys have each processed their trauma from this drastic change in their lives and come to a place of peace with it -- at least for now. It has't been pretty. Their rage has been huge, and almost always directed at me. After rage came all the crying, and then quiet, and then hugs.

I've done the same process in the adult form. After the initial adrenaline and fear launched me through the first week, I started to sleep a lot, and wander around disengaged, keeping earbuds in  half listening to an audiobook to escape from the seemingly endless loop of housewifedom I had entered. I said goodbye to my business, my goals, and the autonomy I've clawed my way toward for seven years. It's not gone forever, but it needed to be put to rest for now so I can get down to the work at hand.

Easter came and went in that peaceful new space we had entered. We've begun moving in tiny concentric circles of play this week, and are not missing anything all that much. 

We moved our "schooling" life outdoors. Setting up our supplies with a small nod to the Waldorf traditions but with the flexibility of not having to adhere to anything that doesn't interest us in that moment. Everyone is happier with this open learning plan. 

We planted our "victory garden" a few weeks ago and it sprouted fast. We'll be growing all our salad greens this Spring/Summer/Fall. 

Bread has been my therapy. I finally made legit baguettes and a good first stab at laminated pastry.

Joel has been a rock through all this. He's had to keep getting up at 5:30am to take meetings and drive his company forward. He's poised to somehow still have one of the most successful years of his career and yet in all that endless work he's managed to be a hands-on Dad and has summoned the energy to cook dinner nearly every night. We are learning to make fancy cocktails and create our date nights with whatever we have. It's not all bad. 

The World Under Quarantine

In early February we hosted some dear friends here from the UK who had just been on a cruise on the Grand Princess, yes, that Grand Princess. We felt we were sending them off home just in time and we were more right about that than we ever wished to be. The very following voyage, as the GP disembarked from San Francisco for Mexico, she would take with her their first COVID-19 passenger and a health disaster on board would begin.

The following week our friend from France (who we met in Singapore) and a co-worker from Atlanta were here. We enjoyed wine and lovely dinners and talked about the looming crisis. Then we shopped for masks for their upcoming flights home and noticed our first sign of foreboding when we found panic in the hardware store and nearly empty shelves. We took the rationed number for our guest heading to Paris and then I opened one of our earthquake/fire kits and made sure we were covered as well as our guest departing for Atlanta.

By the end of that week we were talking in detail with friends of ours who were looking at the absolutely real possibility of needing to have enough food on hand to quarantine for a few weeks. Heck, if we were wrong, we just would finally have enough dry goods put away to officially be fire season and earthquake ready again. We carefully picked up just enough to do 14 meals and only enough toilet paper for that time too I might add. Joel noticed absolute panic setting in among some shoppers at Costco. Shouting at employees to help them as they hoarded pallets of things they didn't really need. It was a bizarre display of utter hysteria.

Then the school closures began in the East and South Bay. It was a bit surreal. No one in North America was considering school closures and we only had one COVID-19 case in Marin. But the Grand Princess at this point was sitting out in the SF Bay. 56 of its passengers had come home to Marin and been out and about. Then a week later they were all quarantined because one was ill. We knew we were on the verge of a health disaster here and fully supported the drastic measures the Bay Area decided to use. On March 14 we cancelled our oldest's birthday party and I made my last trip out of the house to get him a cake. By March 16, the official shelter-at-home order came via the county Sheriff.

And here we are, 3 1/2 weeks later. Probably another 8 weeks like this ahead of us. We are bouncing between anxious and grateful. We are as safe as anyone can be in the US right now.