Living in the time of pandemic: COVID-19 (201)
April 8, 2024
Year 4 of COVID in the Bay Area.
Year 5, Day 5: Taking a moment to reflect on the fact that I really didn’t expect to still be writing my weekly posts into Year 5 of COVID and, since we’re going to apparently be living with it forever, is it time to stop tracking the days? It’s mostly a habit now, like masking, but I don’t intend to stop masking any time soon.
We’ve taken the unusual decision to take the kid on an impromptu quick trip into the wilderness (Yosemite). I have been so busy with work and Sera that I have spent exactly ten minutes discussing or thinking about it, PiC did all the planning and booking. It wouldn’t have happened without him but also without me being an active part of the planning meant lots of things were missed. Not all my fault, we always tend to forget one thing unless my list is really extensive and I’ve been working on it for months.
We forgot to pack laundry mesh bags (small deal), warm hats (eh oops), PiC’s driver’s license (big oops), boots for Sera (which she might not have even been willing to wear). We don’t even own boots for the adults. The kids had rain boots that worked for them but my feet went up a half a size each since Smol Acrobat so my warm fuzzy boots don’t fit anymore. Wonder if it’s worth getting a replacement pair sometime.
Year 5, Day 6: Oh my aching everything. What a time for a flare-up. I had lava bones all night and well into the morning. Not great. Not great at all.
While granting that none of this trip was really made for me, I’ve made the grumpy snap judgment that I am not at a stage in my life where I appreciate nature enough to trade it for inhaling this much dust, being this cold, being this cut off from Internet connectivity and functioning GPS (I cannot stress functioning GPS enough) and being an hour of twisty windy long and slow drive away from anything. The majesty of the park struck me but fades into the background of my physical discomfort and preoccupation.
We always knew my body is no longer fit for camping but assumed I’d be fine near nature in a nice enough accommodation.
Ah well. I didn’t actively want this particular trip but didn’t hate the idea enough to abandon PiC to our two children that sometimes behave as if they’re feral so this is roughly the middling experience I was prepared for. The kids had some fun, they had a whole lot of bickering, and a new experience that only one of them will really remember. Sera enjoyed it a lot more than I expected but she was so wiped out by a day of wandering we wondered if we’d broken her. I’ll be glad to be home.
Year 5, Day 7: This day started at 5 am and didn’t end until 2 am the next day. Sera’s symptoms dramatically worsened starting mid-morning and it wasn’t clear if this was related to her existing condition which would be Very Bad or if it was just an entirely unrelated thing. And the only way to determine which situation we had was to take her to the emergency vet after we got home. We took a little time to get settled, luggage in, key pieces unpacked and then packed back up and headed for a long long (long) wait. JB wanted to come with, and I said well, heck, why not. They can be a second pair of hands and it’ll spare PiC the two of them bickering over something asinine. Smol Acrobat was utterly bereft that they couldn’t come too, but I explained that they had already taken a turn at helping me with Sera. They had. Well. Not well. They were supposed to hold out treats for Sera to follow them towards the door, making it easier for me to scoop her up carefully and take her out of the car. In reality they were just Sera’s jackpot. Every single lure treat I put in their hand was immediately served up to her nose for inspection and acceptance. She very quickly realized she didn’t need to go anywhere. Her toddler sibling was her helper monkey. So… That didn’t help. But they did have a turn.
It worked out rather well. JB brought their own entertainment and I bought a secret entertainment for them and dreary old piles of work for me to catch up on. They’d advised the wait could be anywhere from 6-8 hours to see the vet and they were not kidding. Glad we were totally prepared, I caught up on a lot of work.
We sat waiting long enough for my butt to go numb three times over before the vet finally had a moment to discuss the lab results and our next steps. Sera was so happy to leave that place she forgot she wasn’t a spry 6 year old anymore and just threw herself into/at (mostly at) the car. I grabbed her haunches just in time to save her falling back out and got us all home well after midnight but in one piece.
Year 5, Day 8: JB and I were slugs this morning, getting up around 9 or 930, and I had to spend an hour putting the house to rights before I could settle down at my desk. I was taking so long Sera pulled a Seamus: standing at the door of my office giving me a very pointed “get to work” look.
It not being a school day, JB was “free”. They were free to sleep late and putter around a little after breakfast but I put them to work minding the timers on the washing and we got 2 loads washed, dried and put away by midafternoon while I worked and took calls and meetings etc etc. The third load was drying when we took Sera for one of her many walks and I realized, awww buttercups, we have their afternoon lesson to get to. Then I realized nggggah pistachios, I was waiting to get a call confirming Sera’s prescription was ready. Then I realized I can’t pick up Sera’s prescription if I’m taking JB to their lesson. I finally worked it out that we’d go to the lesson and then race up to the vet for the prescription. As long as we got it before 7.
PiC ended up insisting on going for it, so JB and I managed dinner. Then I worked until 11 pm to put a dent in the piles and piles and piles of stuff to do. I hate going into Friday with this much left on my plate but it’s literally the end of the day and night. I don’t have more hours to give. The backlog is really because of the trip, I didn’t work as much as I needed to while on the trip to stay on top of things and I didn’t want to lay off my work to someone else because my someone else is already really busy. So I just have to deal with the discomfort of being behind for a while. I hate that but it’s survivable.
I was telling my therapist it’s been a hard week, and realized it feels like I’m a broken record. Does anyone have easy weeks anymore?
I’m truly not valorizing being busy. I’m prioritizing just the things that are important to create space and budget mental cushion for the unexpected but it sure feels like I fail to manage
Year 5, Day 9: We finally got the news on the layoff and thank everything, PiC was spared this round.
It was a really deep cut and as Bethany foresaw, no one is feeling relief. I had expected to for some reason, at least enough to feel like I could shelve the layoff budget, but that still doesn’t sit right. We don’t know if there will be more this year or not. We know that there will obviously be impacts on the remaining employees. Everyone is, per PiC’s observations, distracted.
Shopping questions!
I need new sneakers. Does anyone have any recommendations for any supportive shoes they like? I need something cushy but nothing specific beyond that. I hate shoe shopping and try to only do it once every fourish years.
And does anyone have a recommendation for good standard towels that don’t pill and don’t cost a fortune? I’m on the hunt for a big stack of them for the Pine Ridge Reservation. The person who manages the Youth Center on the reservation has mentioned they’re supporting a lot of unhoused families at the moment and being able to give them clean towels for showers means a lot.
Yes, I have easy weeks. I have them a lot. Your job sounds like it’s way way way out of whack. I’m sorry to say it. I’m relieved for you that PIC gets to carry on with his job!
Yay that Sera is probably/hopefully okay? Or at least not terrible?
In this case last week seemed super hard mostly because of the travel, the kids and Sera’s ups and downs. Work was annoying icing on a kicking-rocks cake. I realize I made it sound like it was work’s fault when really, I only worked maybe an hour a day for three days (if that), and so naturally by Thursday, there was 2.5 days of work piled up. It was a natural consequence of not taking vacation time – having wildly overestimated how much time I would spend working while away.
But even if work was only part time, I suspect the sum total would still feel hard right now because of everyone’s needs.
Sera is doing better! At least it wasn’t a catastrophic bleeding problem. Whew.
Ahhh I didn’t realize you were working while away. That makes a lot more sense!
THAT part was entirely self-inflicted ;D
I really like Merrell Yokota and Brooks Ghost. Merrell is pretty lightweight with good arch support. I had to put an insert in the Brooks ones and they did start hurting my feet when they gave out (after heavy use though!)
Thanks for the rec! I’m going to start hunting from here.
Re: sneakers: I just had to switch to a new pair of sneakers this week, so it’s a timely topic. I currently wear Brooks Revels with a Sole-brand heat-molded-footbed in place of the one they ship with. My sneakers have been Brooks-only for the last… 10 years? Longer? I’ve tried Merrells, Keens, and Sauconys and my feet rejected them with prejudice, so I stick with what works for me.
Re: easy weeks… I only have an easy week if I engineer having no work during a school week, I get rid of all the life must-dos ahead of time, AND nobody in the house manages to get sick during that week. And then I stay home reading novels during the school day and experience SILENCE. It isn’t quite impossible to pull it off, but I generally have to have it in the works about 1.5-3 months before it actually even has a chance of happening. And I don’t usually think enough to do all that. I think with a kid in the house as young as Smol Acrobat, it’s actually impossible to have a truly easy week.
Thanks for the sneaker thoughts! I’m not sure what works for mine yet, clearly.
That is definitely how it feels right now: quite impossible to engineer. But it’s very validating to know that your experience is along the same lines!