Airing of my grievances, 2020 edition

People who walk in the middle of the neighborhood road when there are PERFECTLY good sidewalks. (I just watched a neighbor do this as I typed.)

"Christians" who don't realize that Jesus wasn't white and he probably wouldn't be down with a lot of their "all these poor people have to have skin in the game" bs (when the majority of these poor people work full-time jobs or multiple part-time jobs or are actually disabled and can't work).

Khaki pants with tennis shoes.

Brittle fingernails. 

That dental and vision insurance aren't considered "health" insurance. Why are these two body parts not considered part of the body when it comes to health? 

Those 5 stray dark hairs that grow on my chin at random intervals so I can't pluck all of them at the same time. 

My husband's inability to find anything in the fridge. 

That children's adorable baby breath becomes stinky teenager breath. 

"Christians" who are SO SURE they are going to heaven that they're like, "I'm cool with dying from COVID cause Jesus loves me," which isn't terribly "Do unto others" because not everyone is so freaking sure of the afterlife and maybe aren't in a big hurry to die. 

That eyeglasses don't come with those cool heater things so you can tighten/loosen your own glasses without having to run back to the optometrist.

When book-to-series adaptations add so many weird things it doesn't even feel like the book (I'm looking at you 11.22.63). 

People who don't cover their freaking NOSES with their masks (like the dumbass checkout kid at Walgreen's). 

Anyone on the internet without medical degrees/epidemiology degrees/science degrees acting like they have more knowledge than individuals with these things. 

When certain people in my household forget to put STUFF ON THE GROCERY LIST.

Most every white.person.problem (including this list).

People who drive for miles and miles with their turn signals on. (It pains me to think about this lack of observance.)

My children who, while I love them, talk about all kinds of shit related to video games and YouTube that I neither know nor care anything about. 

People who talk a lot, in general, but especially in the morning before I've had enough quiet time and/or coffee. 

Middle-age body spread and the chicken neck phenomena.

That ovaries don't just shrivel up and fall out the instant you decide you are done having children. Must we continue with this period bullshit for another 20+ years?

COVID and the dumbass federal response to it. (Thank god all these people who said it is NBD and a hoax are getting vaccinated.)

Receding gums

The way earbuds make my ears itch

Podcasts that are just nonstop talking about mostly inside jokes that nobody else gets. 

Skin tags

Shower grout and its utter disgustingness

Country music. (I just can't. I'm sorry.)

People who screech to not be afraid of COVID but who also track all the burglary reports in their areas almost incessantly. (Why is one type of fear stupid but another type of fear is totally normal?)

The fact that I didn't appreciate my body when it was awesome and didn't crack and have to move slowly in the morning. 

People who cannot read.the.room and include me on emails that if they had any CLUE what I'm like would know that I should NOT be part of that email. 

People who are always looking on the bright side or being chipper. Tone that shit down, please. 

People who aren't teachers or school administrators who keep bitching about why the kids aren't at school as if they even have a CLUE as to all the logistics of school during a pandemic. 

Christmas...all of it. Ugh. 

That there aren't "glaring inefficiency" lines in all venues where people who need super quick things could go. Like basically a 15-item check out lane for everything. So when I'm at Walgreen's during a pandemic, which gives me the heebie-jeebies anyway, I don't have to stand in a long 6-foot distanced line behind Wanda who is returning $40 foot warmers or whatever shit she bought. 

(BASICALLY, WHAT I'M TELLING COMPANIES IS HIRE ENOUGH WORKERS AND QUIT TAKING ALL THE MONEY FOR YOUR STOCKS.)

What I'm realizing as I'm writing this is that The Airing of Grievances is much better done with others because there is a certain amount of brainstorming energy that comes from hearing others grievances. It spurs your brain much better than just blogging.
So I shall post my grievances and perhaps add to them on social media when/if others come up with their own brilliant grievances.

Masculinity and femininity

I spent much of my life not matching whatever the hell it is that "feminine" girls should look like. 

In high school, I cut my hair short. I simply look better and feel better with short hair. I don't have the energy or desire to mess with long hair. 

I was (and I guess still am) shaped like a boy. Minimal boobs. Narrow hips. 

Voluptuous I am not. 

I was also never at all good at that old school "Don't call a boy; wait for a boy to make the first move" junk. I have never once told my daughter any of that garbage. It is ridiculous to put all that pressure on boys. 

Who decided that guys had to make the first move? 

I was always perceived as that "weird" kid. Chances are pretty good I am still perceived as that "weird" middle-aged lady now. 

I remember being asked when I was a kid if I was gay by a group of girls at my Catholic school. I don't know how old I was, but I thought the question was stupid. There was this adult volunteer who had these freaky long nails and I'd lose my shit whenever I saw her; I'd run up and hug her and ask to see her nails. 

Apparently, this qualified as homosexual in the late 1980s. 

And these were the "popular" girls who asked me, so I should probably spell it "stoopid" because that's what their comment was.

In 4th grade, the cutest boy in the school, grabbed me from behind while we were sitting on the floor of the classroom cleaning out our desks and said he was raping me. I guess I was kind of cerebral then because I was like, "Uh, dude. This is not rape." 

Do you see why sending my kids to Catholic school did NOT seem like a better option than sending them to public school? Why pay tuition for this kind of garbage?

I dated two gay guys in college. Admittedly, at the time, they were still figuring things out which I didn't know, but many years later, when things were clear for them and me, it made me consider what I find attractive in a guy. I knew I liked guys, but I definitely never liked that macho, tough guy shit. 

I liked the smart, cultured, eccentric guys. I liked the falsetto singer guys. 

Long before I was a teen, I loved Nick Rhodes of Duran Duran who was so secure he could wear cosmetics and rock out on the synthesizer. He was thin and non-muscley. I guess from the time I was 10 years old, I knew what kind of male I liked and it wasn't the machismo guy.

I married a man who is sensitive and quiet and funny. And virile enough to produce three children without trying too hard.

So I don't understand and have never understood why men have to be a certain whatever. 

I have taken this into how I raise my sons. 

They are smelly and farty and genuinely gross. But they are encouraged to be understanding and empathetic and sensitive. They have never been told not to cry. 

I guess I just think it is all absurd, us humans trying to put each other in these stupid boxes of categorization. 

Like what you like.

Don't be a dick to other people. 

Why is this so hard? 

Drinking is not funny, and yet everything is a joke

I have written articles about excessive alcohol consumption.

My dad's brother died at 48 from cirrhosis of the liver and his father was an abusive alcoholic. 

I'm pretty aware of the dangers of drinking.

I became very cognizant of my alcohol usage at age 21 after I drank WAY too much vodka and had a 5-day hangover. 

I stick to wine and beer, with an occasional margarita or strawberry daiquiri. 

I have no more than 2 glasses. 

Most nights, if I have a beer, it is a half-beer that D and I split. 

I'm also aware that D and I have been drinking more than we ever have as a result of the pandemic. 

Initial research suggests he and I are in very good company and a lot of it. 

My antidepressant is working overtime of late. 

The pandemic is part of it, sure, but my dad's health issues are what has left me reeling. My dad's health issues in combination with the pandemic and being terrified to be near him because his body cannot handle anything else. I cannot risk his health because it is terribly fragile at the moment. 

Nothing is funny right now. 

Everyone drinking more than usual. Everyone more isolated than usual. My dad's health. My emotional health. 

And yet it all feels like a joke; the year of near constant feeling like we're being punked by circumstances beyond our control. 

I can make fun of my liquor store run and stay vigilant to not go overboard, to always be aware that it wouldn't take much to slip over the ledge into addiction. 

That many, many people do something to deal temporarily with an issue and then that "fix" becomes the next real problem. 

Our entire society, maybe our entire world, is doing that now. 

Surviving and knowing that the steps we're taking may be the steps of future unraveling.

On the banana peel / How God is like the Trump Administration

My dad is 78 years old, and my mom is 82. The average life expectancy in the US is 78.87 years (2019).

As my mom said the other day, she's got "one foot on the banana peel."

At this point, with dad having cancer surgery, chemo/radiation, and as of yesterday, emergency surgery for a twisted bowel obstruction, he's got one foot on the peel and is doing a little jig. 

It has made me aware of how I hear of other people going through "hard stuff" and think to myself, "How do they manage that?"

The answer is complex:

1. You go through what you have to because what choice do you have?

2. I think a lot of the time you aren't aware you're going through it until it is done. (Except me, who recognizes we're going through a hot mess at the moment.)

The other night, when mom and dad were in the ER, and we didn't yet know what the diagnosis was, I laid in bed and had angry conversations with God.

Well, not really with God.

God is not my sugar daddy. I don't plead for stuff. I don't wish for things. For my own sanity, I cannot have an anthropomorphized God in my life because he/she/it makes me furious. 

My anger at that instant was directed at people who do the whole "God is good" song and dance when they get the answer they want (no cancer or whatever). But they don't do the "God is an asshole" thing when the answer is not what they want. Then they do the "God's got this" thing.

I'm not poking fun of them because if this gets them through the muck, then have at it. 

But it doesn't get ME through the muck. It just makes me think that God is like the Trump Administration--taking ALL the credit for the good stuff and none of the blame for the bad stuff. 

After lying in bed for several hours, I finally decided that for my own mental health I had to look at Dad's situation as just nature happening. His aging body doing what aging bodies do. Nature is not good nor bad; it simply is, and it does what it does. It is much more calming for me to think this way about my family's shared existence at this time. 

Of course, while all this is going on, I've been interviewing people who have been throwing around preachy moralizing at me, and it is aggravating as hell. 

I'm the doubting Thomas who never gets to put his hand in Jesus' side. I'm the Paul who doesn't have the conversion. And I'm the Carrie who resents other people throwing their "God is good" and "God's got this" into my face even though I know they have good intentions. 

The road to hell is paved with those.

A great year to practice dostadning

Every year I practice dostadning which is also known as Swedish death cleaning. 

Of course, I'm not doing it because I am dying (that I know of) or that I think I'm going to die soon, but clutter makes me anxious. I am the opposite of a hoarder. 

D often worries this time of year that, when I'm on one of my tears, I might throw him and the children out. 

With this being my natural tendency when the whole Marie Kondo trend came along, it was easy for me to do her version because I have long asked myself questions like, "Do I love this item?" and "Do I actually use this item?"

Last week, I cleaned out nearly every room in the house. The storage closet. The furnace room. The litter box room. 

I made one huge run to Goodwill and have my trunk full of other items that I've cleaned out from the garage. I threw away small grocery bags full of junk and cut tons of boxes into small pieces to recycle. 

As much work as this has been, it has occurred to me that our level of stuff is minimal compared to others considering that neither I nor D like to shop and I am habitual about sorting, donating, and dostadning(ing). Plus, for years I have consigned the kids' toys and old clothes as a way to clean out and make a little money to pay for their seasonal needs. 

Of course, as soon as I did all this cleaning, I was gifted some items that are thoughtful but that I have no need for (like another coffee mug). 

[Which reminds me that I haven't cleaned out the mug cabinet....]

It seems to me like 2020 is a good year to clean out clutter....whether that be in one's house or in one's mind or in one's priorities. There's nothing like a global pandemic to help a person put everything into perspective. 

This was one of the reasons I unfriended a hefty dose of individuals on social media. Because they caused me aggravation and unhappiness. They didn't spark joy for me, and I honestly don't have a relationship with them anyway. Just because they are a neighbor or a parent of a kid my kid used to play with ages ago doesn't mean I actually need to be "friends" (however loose that word is when it comes to social media). 

If there is something or someone you don't love, don't need, or doesn't have much meaning to you, 2020 is probably all the excuse you need to clean it/them out. 

The gratefulness that comes with delaying gratification

I have two parents who modeled for me the internal power that comes with delaying gratification. 

I don't know if this stemmed from their own experiences as being one of five or six children in their respective families of origin. I don't know if it stemmed from both being brought up relatively poor. I don't know if it was because of their Catholic faith. I don't know if they simply have personalities that made delaying gratification easier. 

Whatever the reason, my parents modeled an ability to look long-term, weigh decisions carefully, and not get everything they may have wanted when they wanted it. My brother and I did not get everything we wanted when we wanted it. My parents were pretty good at saying "no."

Now, at the time, I hated this. I didn't understand why we couldn't get call-waiting back when that was a newfangled feature on landlines. I didn't understand why we couldn't get MTV when all my friends had it. I didn't understand why my parents wouldn't buy me the name brand shoes I wanted. 

But my parents lived within their means and valued education over all else. One of the greatest gifts they gave me as a result of delaying our familial gratification was a college education with no loans or debt for any of us. 

Because they said no, as an adult I appreciated and respected delaying my gratification. This doesn't mean I LIKED it. Delaying gratification sucks, more or less. 

When D and I got engaged, I told him we would not marry until he finished his master's degree. He had been sitting on his thesis for a while, and I was determined he would finish it. So we set our wedding date 18 months out. We didn't get an apartment together but lived in our parents' homes to save money for a down payment on a house. We decided to live only on his salary and get whatever house we could afford on that so that we could save everything I made. 

All of these decisions were efforts in delaying gratification for a bigger and hopefully better outcome. If he completed his master's, he would hopefully make more money long term. It would hopefully provide more stability. If we lived with our parents, we could save more money for a down-payment. If we lived on one salary, it would make it possible for us to save a lot and me to stay home with our children without too much adjustment down the line if we ever had a family. 

But delaying gratification means not getting exactly what you want and definitely not when you want it. Living with our parents was not fun for two madly in love people who just wanted to have lots of sex with each other. Living on one salary meant we had to budget and give up getting material things we might have gotten on two salaries. (But it did allow me to have the money to put towards a master's degree.)

Ultimately, being taught to delay my gratification made me a person who is able to take a long view and not get my panties in a twist if I can't have stuff instantaneously. 

It makes it easier for me to not lose my mind by not having Thanksgiving (and likely Christmas) with extended family (or even closer family). 

Delaying gratification actually gives me a greater sense of gratefulness for all the other holidays I have completely taken for granted because we just did those without thinking. Being together for Thanksgiving and Christmas is just.what.we.did. 

There is an ache because we can't do the "normal," but that ache is also what drives my sense of thankfulness. If we decided to all be together, I wouldn't have that ache, which means I wouldn't have that poignant feeling of appreciating the abundance of the past and hoping that next year, perhaps because we have erred on the side of extreme caution, we can all safely be together again without anyone missing.  

The movie "Speed," except a virus is driving the bus

A former coworker of mine now works at a local hospital. She posted that the hospital system is experiencing "critical staffing" issues. 

I overheard a conversation where a nurse was saying local medical systems are preparing to freeze non-emergency surgeries because of virus quarantines and illness. 

In small towns/cities where COVID is rampant, there isn't enough room at hospitals for COVID patients. 

Numerous governors are starting to restrict restaurants/bars and activities where groups of people meet and are, at least part of the time, maskless. 

And it all sucks. 

It sucks for the people who can't go out to eat because maybe that was their way of doing something fun when everything sucks.

It sucks for the restaurant industry that has been slammed from every direction.

It sucks for the local economies, which means it sucks for everyone whose tax dollars have to stretch even tighter. 

It sucks for the leaders who have to decide between restricting freedoms and hospitals being completely overwhelmed/more people getting sick and dying. 

It sucks for people who have depression and anxiety.

It sucks for people going through chemo and cancer whose immune systems are already blitzed.

It sucks for people who work from home; it sucks for people who can't work from home.

It sucks for kids in school who have to distance and wear masks; it sucks for kids who aren't in school and have to do online.

IT SUCKS FOR EVERYONE. 

As of Nov 19, the case fatality rate in the US is 2.2 percent. And this sounds great until you multiple 2.2 percent times the number of people who live in the US, which is 330 million people. 

0.022 x 330 million = 7.26 million DEATHS

We are now at 250,000 deaths. So if we multiply that number by 29 we will have almost 7.26 million.

All of our options are BAD. 

There are no good options; there are only BAD options with BAD consequences.

And with this virus, if enough people (and there are enough people) fear it and fear millions of people dying, they are not going to act normally even if leaders do absolutely nothing except sit on their couches and eat bonbons. 

They aren't going to shop or eat out or go anywhere or do much of anything while the virus is running rampant even if my governor and your governor and the president and everyone else says "Everything is fine; go about your business." 

Because they know their friends are getting sick; they know people who are very ill or in the hospital or who have died. 

And while I could be wrong and there could be a mass conspiracy where every nation on the planet and doctors in North and South Dakota have agreed to bury empty coffins and do interviews about how bad everything is virus-wise, I doubt it.

November thankfulness, Days 1-17

Usually, I try to post one thing each day in November that I'm thankful for, and I always try to find the most unusual things I can find.

I do this because it is all too easy to be thankful for the obvious. It doesn't take a whole lot of thought to feel thankful for my family and good health. I try to pay attention to the things that I typically ignore that, though small and seemingly insignificant, bring me pleasure or joy or a sense of wonder.

Though numbered these aren't in any particular order:

1--I'm thankful my uncle, who passed away earlier this year, wanted me to have the V family history and entrusted me with it. He knew I was interested and would take care of it. I hope to one day find out where the family originated, though the local settlers came to KY in 1779 from Pennsylvania. Where did they live before that?

2--I'm thankful for good-smelling candles and hand soaps. I normally do not hoard candles or soaps (or anything if I can help it), but I have found considerable comfort since COVID began lighting candles and smelling nice scents when I wash my hands, which is a lot. 

3--I'm thankful for having time at home with our stupid cats. Normally we are running a lot during the school year, but online school is giving us lots of snuggle time with these goobers. A whole lot of frustration is averted or minimized when you get to see cuteness. 

4--I'm thankful for G's therapist. Though the pandemic took the remarkable strides G made between fall of 2019 and Feb of 2020 and more or less dumped them down the drain, being able to have periodic telehealth appointments with Dr. S helps keep G on track as much as anyone can be on track during a worldwide pandemic.

5--I'm thankful that the pandemic gave me time in the spring to learn how to crochet. I find it very calming. I listen to my audiobook and work with my hands. It is very meditative. I would not have done this were it not for quarantining.

6--I'm thankful that G wanted to clean and rearrange his room yesterday because it launched me into a day of purging. It feels very, very good to get rid of stuff. It feels very good to think about whether items I own are things I actually use or wear. Do I love them? Do they just take up stuff? Are they junk to me? 

7--I'm thankful that I can read. While I may not read 100 books this year, as I did last year, I'll be pretty close. Reading has been hard this year because of my frequent doomscrolling between pandemic news, social unrest news, and election news. Still, I'm glad it provides me a means of some escape.

8--I'm thankful N got her first job this summer. While she has long had a neighborhood pet-sitting business (which her brothers are now doing more than she is), this job has helped build her confidence and real-world experience. 

9--I'm thankful I could sub for someone who had breast cancer surgery. More importantly, I'm thankful I could sub for this person because I hated this person when I was a kid. It reminds me that a childhood perspective can be sometimes flawed and/or limited. It helps remind me that hanging onto childhood animosity can be stupid and limiting. 

10--I'm thankful I was COVID negative, at least as of last Tuesday. I do not know if that will continue to be the case (especially since another uncle died, and I went to the funeral home). We all wore masks and tried to distance, but you never know. 

11--I'm thankful for my OCD because it prepared me to be vigilant during a pandemic. Prior to COVID, I carried 3 hand sanitizers in my bag. Now I carry 4. I had trained myself to not touch my face. OCD generally sucks, but not when it comes to pandemic lifestyle changes. I handwash like a BOSS. 

12--I'm thankful to be listening to music more. I have recently re-upped songs to my playlist that I had forgotten. When everything is "meh," a little Violent Femmes and Beastie Boys send my energy back to middle school levels (at least temporarily; who can sustain that junk at age 47).

13--I'm thankful for texting and Facetime. With COVID rates rising (I originally spelled rats; Freudian, I think), we're trying to keep away from grandparents. It DOES suck to not see them, but I think about pioneers and families that traveled to California from Japan who NEVER SAW THEIR FAMILIES EVER AGAIN. They didn't have reliable mail service; heck, many pioneers didn't know how to write at all. As much as people complain about "kids" not knowing how to delay their gratification, I think we've got an entire society that sucks at it. (Grown-ups, I'm talking to your asses.)

14--I'm thankful for the public library system. They do curbside pickups now, and since reopening have been a lifesaver for me and the kids. I tell them regularly how much I appreciate them making books available.

15--I'm thankful I've let go of this notion that I have to stay "socially connected" to people I really and truly have zero relationship with or who I actually (and actively) dislike. To stay "friends" with someone you genuinely don't like and don't spend time with and who actively makes your life unpleasant when they post stuff is bonafide dumb. It took me entirely too long to recognize that. 

16--I'm thankful I'm don't have to be an "always right" parent. I'm often wrong, and it is much better to admit that (both to myself and my kids). Just because something is "right" for me doesn't mean it is "right" for my kids. It seems like recognizing that before they are adults makes life easier. That doesn't mean we always agree, but we always discuss. 

17--I'm thankful for hand-me-down clothes from my children. I recently acquired an old Stranger Things t-shirt, a pair of leggings, and a perfect cardigan wrap. 

A whole new respect for the electoral process

This semester I'm teaching an American Government class which is the best way to force yourself to relearn all those things about the American government you forgot from middle and high school.  

Working as an election official is also a great opportunity to learn more about elections and how American government works.

Lord knows that working one election makes me an expert in exactly nothing, but I did learn a lot and the experience has helped me better understand how difficult it is to commit election fraud and why people are unlikely to do it. 

For example, at least in my state, if an individual requests an absentee ballot and receives it but doesn't follow directions (and therefore screws it up) or loses/misplaces it, that individual cannot receive another one. 

If a person never receives an absentee ballot, the board of elections can/will cancel the first absentee ballot so the individual can vote in person provided an election officer calls them and verifies everything. However, since the first absentee ballot has now been canceled, even if the individual lied that they never received it and sent it in, with the goal of voting twice, that first ballot will not be accepted/counted. 

In my state, identification has to be shown, although it doesn't HAVE to be a photo id. It can be a passport or social security card or Medicaid card--something with a signature. 

Now, I know some people think not showing a photo id means it is easy for someone to vote multiple times, perhaps by lying and saying they are someone else. Or maybe they stole someone else's Social Security card? 

Here is why this is unlikely:

Poll workers stay the entire day at their election site (they cannot leave the property) which means they have been watching people come to vote all.day.long. In a "normal year" when there isn't a pandemic, fewer people go to smaller precincts which makes it more likely the workers would remember someone coming in twice. In this abnormal year, there were over 100 poll workers, which increases the likelihood that someone would notice a "repeat customer" should that happen. 

Is it possible for someone to go from precinct to precinct to vote multiple times? 

Yes, I guess it is possible, but what would motivate a person to do this given that election fraud is a Class D felony? My assumption is that if someone voted 5 times illegally, they would be charged for 5 Class D felonies, which means they could be looking at 25 years in prison. 

What is the likelihood of someone taking a chance on 25 years in prison to vote 5 additional times? 

Are 5 additional votes going to make a difference? Not likely.

And if only 5 votes are the difference between a candidate winning or losing, there would be a recount, which would mean greater scrutiny of votes. 

Is it possible? Well, sure. We've all heard of stupid criminals, but it is very, very improbable. 

Is it possible that election officials could commit election fraud? 

Each person who works at an election site must swear an oath to follow the US Constitution and their state laws in order to help people to vote. Some areas are able to pay their poll workers, while other areas do not have the funds to do this. 

I arrived at the precinct where I worked at 4:45 am and left that evening at 6:30 pm. My area pays its election officials (which I did not know until I got there that morning). I made around $14/hour before taxes. 

I can assure you that there is NO FREAKING WAY ON THIS EARTH THAT I WOULD COMMIT VOTER FRAUD WHEN I AM BEING PAID SOMEWHERE BETWEEN ZERO DOLLARS AND $14 AN HOUR. 

There is absolutely zero incentive for me to commit fraud. 

Right now, absentee ballots votes are being counted in multiple states, and there are mumblings about fraud. 

Again, as mentioned above, this is not likely. 

Could the election officers who are counting commit fraud?

Possible, but they, too, would commit a felony if they tried to tabulate incorrectly or not tabulate at all. 

Is an election official likely to do this? 

No....because what incentive do they have? If they work for the county clerk in their respective area, they would be committing a felony AND losing their job as a result of committing that felony. 

I sometimes hear mumblings about "illegals" voting, which is unlikely for a very important reason. 

Let's assume someone is living in the country illegally. This individual would want the government to not know where they are, what they are doing, right? 

If I am trying not to be deported, I'm very, very, very unlikely to go register to vote and show my id and, once again, commit a felony. 

All of this is to say that despite conspiracy theories, it makes very little sense for people to commit voter fraud. 

Macbeth, MacDuff, social/political context, and being a man

I love to teach Macbeth to high school students because it is just packed full of so much humanity, and even though it is hundreds of years old, it is written in such a way that it is eternally relevant. 

My copy of Macbeth.

The other night a friend and I went to see a parking lot performance of the play (which was just brilliant for making theater happen safely for audiences during a pandemic). Even though I have read the play numerous times and seen the play performed numerous times, I was struck by how much the play relates to something I've seen being discussed lately in modern politics: 

What makes a man?

There seems to be a juxtaposition between Donald Trump as a "manly man" and Joe Biden as not because of showing affection to his son. I realize social media is not real life, but there seems to be this idea of a man as either 

1--physically strong, macho, won't back down, won't take no for an answer, grab 'em by the pussy

OR

2--affectionate with kids and dogs and therefore able to be taken advantage of. Rather than grabbing others by the pussy, this version of a man is that he is the pussy. 

A writer/professor I follow on Twitter recently wrote an article about this exact topic. 

I'm just going to acknowledge that it is stupid to have these polarities because manliness can be a lot of different things just as being a woman can be many things. A woman doesn't have to be maternal, just as a man doesn't have to be a clone of John Wayne. The context of the moment, though, is that there are two different men running for president who have drastically different "what a man is" personas. 

This is a central focus in Macbeth. Lady Macbeth gives her husband hell about having the balls to kill the king. "Be a man!" she more or less says to him. And so Macbeth becomes that "manly man" who ravages those around him, although after his first murder he does his killing mercilessly from a distance--he hires his murders out to others. He becomes paranoid and chaotic. 

On the other side, we have Macduff, whose wife and children Macbeth has someone else murder. When Macduff is told to "Dispute [their deaths] like a man," his reply shows the other option of what it means to be a man:

"I shall do so; But I must also feel it as a man, I cannot but remember such things were that were most precious to me." 

The entire play is a drama about the choices men make----to put ambition before everything else; to listen to others (in this case a lady) who insult them and badger them into "acting as a man" even when they know it is the wrong thing to do; to continue on the evil rampage because they've already gone too far and it's not worth it to turn back. 

It is always intellectually stimulating (those emotionally exhausting) when modern politics and Shakespeare's writing converge. 

I'm starting to feel differently about death

I have always been fascinated by death, and I doubt that will ever change. I have also always been terrified of death, although that bit seems to be changing. And yet, I've always understood suicide--the need/desire to end it all, to just be free of consciousness forever. 

The actual physicality of dying and decay is intriguing. 

This past summer I read Mary Roach's book Stiff, and I couldn't read it fast enough. I didn't know this place existed until I read this book. I regularly tell G that he should be a forensic doctor because he loves to poke at dead things or cut into preserved corpses (of worms, fish, etc). N has an interest in forensics, too. M gets "sicky" easily, so he will be the one who opts out of anything remotely related to blood and bone.

I have been reading the kids the His Dark Materials trilogy by Philip Pullman for the past several months. I read this series probably 20 years ago before I had children, so I had forgotten a TON. 

The other night, though, we got to the point in The Amber Spyglass, where Lyra meets her Death, and I loved the idea that from the moment a person is born, their death essentially hangs with them through every experience, ready when the time comes to take their hand and gently escort them into the great beyond. Essentially, the death functions similarly to the soul. In this book, both are personified. 

I don't know what I believe about death...what happens after, although my biggest sense is nothing. You simply don't exist anymore. Just as my consciousness of life didn't happen at the moment of my birth, and I remember nothing of the "before" or my birth or the several years after my birth, I think death will be the same. 

A while back I listened to an audiobook by Barbara Ehrenreich titled Natural Causes, and there was a part that struck me:

"You can think of death as a tragic interruption of your life... or, more realistically, you can think of life as an interruption of an eternity of personal nonexistence, and see it as a brief opportunity to observe and interact with the living, ever-surprising world around us."

I think it is pretty normal to feel scared of death when you're young, but the older I get, the more I understand that death can begin to feel like a relief. This doesn't mean you don't want to live anymore, but it means that due to the physical burdens of living (fatigue, disease, aging bones and muscles, etc.), you are tired. There is a point when many people if they live long enough are simply exhausted. They don't actively wish to die but they are okay with the prospect of eternal "sleep" and rest. 

And yet, I also understand the desire to not exist anymore as a young person due to the confusion and the angst and the general unmoored feelings that a person can have when they are still raging at figuring things out or if depression has taken hold of them. 

Several years ago I spoke to a mom whose son was having suicidal thoughts, and she had never had those herself. She couldn't wrap her head around the idea, and so I explained to her that I had sort of always had suicidal thoughts. It was as strange to me to imagine a person never having such thoughts as it was to her to imagine someone having them at all. 

My dad's diagnosis with face/neck cancer this summer and his current chemotherapy (which is preventative since his cancer has not metastasized) has me tuned into mortality. For this to coincide with a pandemic that has taken over 200,000 lives makes it even scarier. 

I don't like to think of my parents dying, and yet being forced to reckon with it provides a silver lining. Last year when Dad had his open-heart surgery to repair a valve and was still in the hospital, I helped him out of bed one day and bathed his back while my mom went home to shower. I am not a sentimental person, but this was a profoundly important experience for me (and why are my eyes getting bleary right now.) 

Sorry. Needed a tissue. 

Helping my dad in that moment was one of the most meaningful experiences in my life, right up there with marrying and having children. Seeing my dad vulnerable was a gift. 

Damn. More tissues. 

Seeing my dad vulnerable then was a gift. Seeing my dad vulnerable now during his cancer is a gift.

It is not a gift I expected or want at all. AT ALL.

But to see it only as a burden and sadness misses a large part of the picture of what it means to be human and have a meaningful life. 

Nothing rhymes with 11

Dear M,

My bonus baby monkey boy is 11 now, and that is hard to believe. 

You've have changed a lot in the past year. 

Not only did your braces (Phase I) come off, you have finally, FINALLY been separating yourself a bit from your brother. You are no longer ruled so much by "Same thing as G" as you once were.

Your snark is definitely developing which is frequently hilarious for all of us. 

You continue to be the one person in the family who mispronounces words in your own unique way, usually putting accents on unique syllables. When we saw the movie "Gemini Man" listed on Netflix, you said "Gem-een-nee." We still laugh at the way you called a neighborhood dog Mur-reeeee a couple years ago (Murray). 

Like other 11-year-old boys, you are way into farting. Fortunately, you have not yet entered the "stinking from all areas and orifices" stage. You still pretty willingly take baths. 

Your 5th-grade year certainly looks different with doing virtual school, but you have been so responsible and attentive to your work which makes me proud. I'm not sure what you'll be when you grow up, but based on how much I have to tug things out of you, I'm not certain writing will be your top career prospect. And we know you get sicky from all things blood, bruise, and wound-oriented so nursing or doctoring are out. 

One day when we walked to the new construction in the back of the neighborhood, you said it might be fun to build houses. We will see, I guess.

You continue to be the cat whisperer in the house, at least to the one with white paws. She will follow you anywhere and everywhere. Up the stairs, down the stairs; it doesn't matter. She often sleeps at the end of your bed or lies on your desk to keep you company. 

You've discovered how fun it is to take pics on my phone and you regularly go without a shirt, no matter the weather. Often you do both at the same time.

I hope you have a good year even though coming up to 11 has been all pandemic(y) and not super great. Fortunately, you've got a positive attitude and sense of humor which will help you manage whatever life throws at you. 

I love you bunches, my favorite ear twiddler.

Momma

He's mostly unclean, and now he's 13

 Dear G,

You are now in the greasy stage of your life. 

Thirteen years ago, you were in what I call the "wormy" stage of life when you just wiggled and slept and didn't do anything to make me think you were a vertebrate. 

You were a worm, but a cute and chubby one. 

Anyway, now at 13 (officially) your hair is literally so greasy that I refuse to hug you some days until or unless you take a bath and wash it. 

You are approximately 2 inches shorter than me now when barefooted and you are rock solid. I know this because when you sometimes come downstairs in the morning and sit on my lap, it is like a gigantic boulder of butt muscle has planted itself on my thighs.  I know this will only get worse the bigger and taller you get. 

But it will one day make for some hilarious photo recreations. 

You are more and more a young man. (With nice hair, I must say.)

Last week you got braces, which you wanted to go ahead and get done because as you said, "7th grade sucks anyway."

The older you get, the more like your dad you become.

Like the pandemic and online school has totally been NBD for you. You and your dad are both like, "What? Talk to people? Like....in real life?" Staying at home and playing video games is what you were born to do. 

The pandemic did put a huge kink in all the work you had done with your OCD therapy, but you are doing ok. The two of us went out to buy you new shoes last weekend and we finished in 30 minutes. And neither of us yelled or came out bloody. It was a miracle!

You also got new shorts and shirts (size men's small) this summer and have worn them without incident.

Sometimes you are a giant pain in the butt, but we realized at some point that without you in the family, we would have like zero memorable stories from vacations and stuff.

If it wasn't for you getting your hand stuck in the lobster statue in Edisto Island, we might not even remember that trip, for example.

If you hadn't thrown yourself dramatically on large rocks in the Rocky Mountains because we made you hike and you were overwhelmed (and also a drama queen), we'd have no hilarious pictures to look at now.  

And this summer you were the only one to catch a big-ass fish when we had our family vacation!

You have always, always forged your own unique path, which has been a lot of a headache and also funny, but usually only when we're past it. 

Except for this which always was and always will be hilarious. 

(Gangnam Style, yo)

Being your mom has made me learn a lot about patience and anxiety and the need to be chill since together we are both very low on chill. 

Being your mom has helped me be a better person, I think. 

I'm so proud of the young man you are becoming, and I hope I can guide you to be genuinely yourself in a world that likes to pigeonhole people. 

I love you, weirdo.

Momma

Captain's log: It's all meh

 It's day "Who Knows" here on the ship.

I'd like to tell the world and Mother Nature that me dealing with perimenopause is a TERRIBLE time to also have a worldwide pandemic meaning I have zero time alone in my house. 

Someone is always around...even if they aren't bothersome. And sometimes just being not bothersome but around is really, really annoying. 

Also sometimes the pre-teen comes upstairs near my former-dining-room-now-office with his headset on yapping at his friend, and it is all I can do not to strangle him because of all the dumb that is seeping out of his mouth and into the air. 

The kids are doing ok with online school. They like sleeping in. They like not being in a school building for 7+ hours. 

I'm ok with online school because it is giving some structure to their days. 

We're not setting the world on fire with genius over here, but we weren't before the pandemic either. 

I have actually been subbing 3 days a week for the past 3 weeks, which is ok. (Although I will not be sad when it is over because, whether it is online or not, it is still subbing. I don't do it for the joy; I do it for the regular paycheck.)

My left eye is red today which may be due to getting a flu shot yesterday, or it may be due to not sleeping well on Sunday night. Sometimes that happens, and it is annoying.

My dermatologist had to cut a spot off the back of my leg. She asked me if that was ok. I told I didn't want it to begin with and she could have it. 

My dad had a big ole cancerous spot cut out of his face last week and has been doing his best impression of an extra on The Pirates of the Caribbean movie (in terms of big slashy scars on the face). While the cancer hasn't spread to lymph nodes or beyond, his doctors want him to do chemo in addition to radiation. While we are happy it hasn't spread and things could be worse, the word chemo just feels heavy even if it is preventative. 

G becomes an actual full-fledged teenager in days, and he is all kinds of almost the same size as me. He is wearing a size 9 wide men's shoe now, which is trippy as heck. 

And N is talking playing field hockey in college which is only like minutes away.

Someone from a recruiting outfit called me and didn't seem to understand that "I don't like sports and haven't videotaped my kid play because that would interfere with the READING I do at her games." 

Yes, I totally said this to him. I'm pretty sure no one has ever said this to him based on his response.

I have a dentist appointment this week.

So life is not bad by a long shot but it feels so, so meh. 

Shit pot stirrer or the person who wants the shit out of the pot and cleaned?

It has occurred to me (and perhaps to some people who know me) that I might be thought of as a person who stirs the shit pot.

However, I don't seek out drama. The reason I have long been Beautification Chairperson at my kids' elementary school is that I hate drama, cliques, and discussing/debating things that aren't gonna matter 5 months from now (such as what kind of cheap Oriental Trading festival prizes to get). 

I am perfectly happy being not-in-the-middle of things.

I am perfectly happy to extend grace to others. 

I don't complain to the manager. I don't leave bad Yelp reviews. 

However, if I see crap going on that is consistently corrupt, unjust, inconsistent, poorly managed, or thoughtless, I may say and/or do something IF such things are likely to matter 5 months from now. 

Unfortunately, I think that for some people, a requirement for being a "team player" means being the type of person who blindly goes along with anyone without thinking and/or making necessary changes. 

I am not a wet-carpet, sure-go-ahead-and-walk-all-over-me type of person. 

Last week, I nominated myself for the SBDM at N's high school. 

If I am elected, great. Maybe I can help make good things better and bad things ok.

If I am not elected, great. Then I don't have to listen in on meetings that will almost certainly go on longer than I think is necessary and/or fruitful. 

Last week, I also went to tryouts to help "monitor" the mask-wearing by the girls on the field hockey team. 

I don't actually care if they have a season. 

I have zero  (-200) interest in sports. 

Sure, I would console with N about any sadness/disappointment she would have if the season didn't happen or ends early, but I also think about people during civil wars who give up EVERYTHING for years, and I think a lost season due to a pandemic is relatively small beans. 

I called out some girls who kept pulling down their masks, which I'm sure they didn't appreciate. 

Some people might think this was stirring a shit pot. I look at it as trying to keep the pot COVID-free so these girls can have a season that they (but not I) care about. 

Another way in which I might be considered a shit-pot-stirrer is that I don't do things because someone somewhere decided that this is what a person "should" do. I like to do some actual thinking about why I'm doing whatever I'm doing or not doing. 

If I'm being paid to do or not do something, I consider that. 

If it is illegal to do or not do something, I consider that. 

If it harms or potentially harms another person's body or feelings, I consider that. 

But if it doesn't meet any of those criteria, I may very likely decide I'm gonna do what I want. 

For example, last night at N's game before which the national anthem instrumental was played, I remained seated. 

I wasn't getting paid. I didn't break the law. And I didn't harm anyone. 

I personally think playing the national anthem should be like telling someone you love them. It should be something special, meaningful, carefully selected, and meant when it is done. It makes a little sense for the exception for the national anthem to be played for national leagues (NBA, NFL). I have no problem with the national anthem at special government events/functions. Olympics games....go for it.

But average Tom, Dick, and Harry elementary, middle school, high school, college sporting event? 

C'mon. 

Did my not standing hurt someone's feelings? (And yes, I have thought about that.)

It may have hurt someone's sensibilities, but those are not the same as feelings. 

If all of this aforementioned stuff means I'm a shit-pot stirrer, well, I guess I'll accept the title. 

But I respectfully disagree with that assessment. 

Adjustment to online school during COVID (and what school is and isn't)

Before the district made the decision to go to full online school, I had asked N how she felt about the possibility of going to school in-person.

As the oldest and most social of my children, I felt like she would be the one most impacted by being at home. 

Her response surprised me.

She said she didn't trust fellow students to make smart choices for themselves and others and that going to school in person would cause her anxiety.

I had determined that if the district went back in person I was going to have my kids do online work and resign as a sub. 

Things for these first days have been somewhere between alright and crappy, depending on the moment, which I think sums up the entirety of 2020. 

It's not fantastic; it's not knocking anyone's socks off, but we're hanging in. 

If nothing else, the kids have a routine again.

And there ARE positives to this online school thing, such as not having middle and high school students wake up at 5:30 in the morning in order to be at school by 7:20. 

I'm enjoying not driving all over creation all the time.

I'm glad my kids are not having to do the reams of waiting that is just part of in-school school. Waiting in the gym before they can go to their classes in the morning. Waiting for announcements to begin. Waiting to line up and then waiting in line for the doofuses to get in line or stop talking. Waiting in line at the bathroom. Waiting in line in the cafeteria. Waiting at the end of the day after they've gotten their stuff ready. (I don't think most parents have any clue how much time in school is spent not doing "learning" as they envision it.)

And that's not all the waiting. There is also the waiting that kids do whether they pick up things quickly, in which case they finish up and are told to "read to themselves" which is also known as "waiting." The kids who don't pick up things quickly have to wait for the teacher to move on from another student that needs individual attention.

I'm not saying this to suggest in-school school is bad. What I'm saying is in-school school is imperfect. And just like when someone is deceased (which in a way is what COVID has done to in-person school), many people are making in-person school out to be the GOAT. We've now endowed sainthood on something that really didn't deserve it; we only act this way because we don't have it now. 

I have modified some of my expectations about things I want my kids to know and do mostly because I'm becoming very good at asking the question, "WHO DECIDED?"

Like "Who decided that it is the failing of civilization if kids don't learn cursive, and why am I allowing myself to think this is the case?"

So I'm having the boys practice their full legal names because, really, this is all they will ever need to sign in most cases. 

And if they decide to become scholars of primary source material they will be motivated on their own to figure it out. 

I think COVID can be an opportunity to parents, students, and really, anyone, to have the opportunity to ask "Who decided?" about a lot of things.

COVID questions I ask myself

COVID-think is a thing now.

Here are some of the questions I ask myself:

1. Is whatever it is I'm thinking of doing worth getting sick to do?

Like if I run to Target for underwear and get sick from it, I will be really ticked off. And there is very, very little that I'm so anxious to do that I would be willing to chance getting sick to do it.

2. Is whomever I'm thinking about seeing someone that is worth me getting sick to see?

In my head, there are now tiers of people importance. You probably don't want to know which tier you're on.

3. If I do whatever it is I think I want to do, will I actually have fun doing it if I have to wear a mask and feel anxious around people?

Like flying. While I would love to go to France, I would hate to be in an airplane even if everyone is in masks. I don't like flying anyway and require extensive amounts of Xanax. With COVID, this would be entirely too much anxiety, therefore not worth it.

Also, France, Denmark, Amsterdam, Spain, Hungary, and Japan won't let me (or any of us COVID-y Americans in).

4. How long will Kroger keep their curbside pickup free of charge, and if they decide to once again charge $4.95 per pickup, is it worth $4.95 to avoid humans in the store?

There was a time when I was cheap and would have said my time is worth the $4.95 to schlep around for my own groceries, but it is worth my peace of mind to pay the $4.95 to avoid people.

5. How bad must things be when the gal working at the state park last week (which was very un-peoply on a Tuesday) thanked me for complying with mask-wearing and being nice about it?

I mean, this particular visitor center was about the size of the main floor of my house, so not huge. There weren't nooks and crannies where one could go to "get away." I don't understand why people are being such complete assholes, especially to people at places of business who have ZERO power to change anything even if they wanted to.

6. How many days can I go between showers without feeling completely funky?

My body can go at least 3 days, but my hair says no more than that. I have tested this.

7. Do my kids' brains still work?

My 16-year-old told me the other morning when it looked very overcast that she hoped it didn't "thunder rain."

At this point, I looked at her and said, "You mean "storm?"

And she replied, "Yes."

The answer to Question #7 is no.

The USPS and other COVID-y things

 Lawd amighty. 

There is some serious discontent in my neighborhood surrounding the USPS, which I find pretty funny, mostly because the folks who seem to do the most complaining on our neighborhood FB page are diehard Republicans. And a more efficient, less wasteful USPS seems like it is exactly in-line with conservative principles.

Principles. Shminciples.

Principles don't matter when it concerns MY mail, I guess. 

Don't get me wrong. I'm not loving things books taking a much longer time to arrive. 

Still, not getting things instantaneously is a good reminder to me of how spoiled we've all become by modern life.

It's not a bad thing to have to wait.

I mean, hasn't this been what every parent since the beginning of time has been saying to their children?

Doesn't delaying gratification build character? 

There is much I don't love about COVID-life, but it's not such a bad thing for my children to have to remember to write down on a list what they want me to order from the grocery and then have to wait for the next time I pick up groceries.

It's not a bad thing that my children aren't being able to do exactly whatever they want to do whenever they want to do it.

I wish many of the adults would get a handle on themselves and be reminded that they, too, can learn to manage their disappointment.

Myopia that has nothing to do with eyesight

I am near-sighted in one eye and far-sighted in the other eye.

I like to think this is a reflection of my personality, too, because I try to see both sides.

That doesn't mean I agree with both sides, but I try to understand where people are coming from.

I understand the desire and need parents have to send their kids back to in-person school.

I understand the feeling that one's kid(s) is doing nothing except playing video games right now in the summer so the idea of doing more screen stuff for the foreseeable future as "school" is not appealing. 

But I have to laugh at the notion that kids, suddenly, now during the pandemic, are for the first time in their lives going to bed at all hours of the night and not keeping a normal schedule.

There is a global pandemic.

Everything, for lack of a better term, sucks. 

But while the pandemic is making things suck more for a lot more people, it doesn't mean that school and everything "normal" made life right as rain before.

And if we suddenly go back to school in person that children's lives will once again be precious and special and whole.

In-person school caused an awful lot of kids stress, for one, whether that stress was teacher-induced or getting up early-induced or not understanding school work-induced. 

And I knew PLENTY of kids who would stay up all hours of the night playing video games and then come to school the next day. 

Just because they were in-person in a school building did not mean they were getting anything like an education. 

They were checked as physically present, but they were emotionally and intellectually not on the premises.

There were many times that I watched students do absolutely nothing. 

Yes, that was with me, a sub. 

But I know from their teachers that they still did nothing. 

EVEN WHEN THEY WERE IN THE FREAKING BUILDING.

They would sit and not work, even with their teachers. 

One teacher I know said one of her classes would get maybe, if she was lucky, 2 days of work in a 5-day period because they just played around and had no interest. 

So I do get my panties in a bunch when adults act like kids were a-ok before pandemic but now are suffering depression and anxiety because they aren't at school.

That appears to be correlation, not causation.

Maybe they are depressed and anxious because there is a GLOBAL FUCKING PANDEMIC.

AND THE ECONOMY IS IN TATTERS BECAUSE THE US, especially, HAS ACTED LIKE WE CAN JUST GO ABOUT OUR BUSINESS AND KEEP ON KEEPIN' ON. 

I'm not sure sending them back to school in a building with its public health rules and the potential for quarantine when someone turns up COVID-positive after two days in the building (hello Charlestown HS) is gonna reduce that anxiety/depression.

For all we know, it could make it worse.

And by saying all this, I'm not suggesting that the kids who stayed up all night and played video games and were just zombies in the building was alright. 

I didn't like it, and it's not right, and I know there are ways to resolve it with enough funding and enough work and making class sizes WAY, WAY smaller than 30 kids or even 15 kids in a class. 

But it is super pollyanna-ish to act like putting bodies in a building is going to make life normal.

The pandemic plus-side (and there are some)

I am a progressive person.
I believe in improvement and making things better and enacting quick change if necessary to make improvements happen.

I do not believe that "things were better" in the past.
If they were so great, why did we strive to get to where we are now?
We only think things were better back when because we aren't living back then.

I sometimes fall into this, especially when I see how much time my kids are spending online since we are not doing much because of COVID. 

When I find myself doing this, however, I try to whisk myself back in time and maybe even do a little Google research.

Sometimes I only need to go back to my own childhood, when my mother thought me watching MTV for hours on end would lead to the atrophying of my brain. 

(Actually, she and my dad wouldn't get cable so I would go to my friends' houses and watch MTV there for hours on end. And she always wondered why I never wanted to invite friends to my house.)

And yet, here I am, with a master's degree and having read 68 books so far in 2020. 

Or I go back to the late 1800s when children my son's ages were working in factories under horrific conditions. 

Or working all day long on a farm doing back-breaking work. 

Or I think to children in other countries who are working in cobalt mines under horrific conditions like right now, in the year 2020. 

Last week I participated in an online lecture about tuberculosis, and I would not want to go back to when TB was epidemic.

Or polio was a thing.

Or smallpox was a thing. 

It is with this in mind, this movement forward and not focusing on what the past was like, that I look at non-traditional instruction for 6 weeks  (the rest of the year cause I know these fools going to pool parties and keggers are not gonna help the virus go away.)

There can be some real positives from online school for my kids such as N being able to work more and earn money to put toward car insurance or car purchase or college expenses. Or G not having to be around other dumb-ass middle schoolers all day (because he doesn't love middle schoolers even though he is one.) Or us being able to do some weekend trips around the state because we have greater flexibility. 

N actually read more books during the spring NTI than she normally does when she is at actual in-person school, and that isn't a bad thing. 

We all aren't running in 15 different directions all the time, which isn't a bad thing. 

NTI means families don't have to buy new uniforms or clothes or shoes or backpacks or lunchboxes or folders and pencils and all that other stuff. 

NTI means some people are finding more time to exercise since they aren't having to drive kids to and from school. 

NTI means kids are maybe having to be adaptable and flexible in ways they haven't had to be. 

And maybe, ultimately, that will be ok and even beneficial for them over the long-term. 

(I have to bite my tongue every time I see a parent comment about their kids potentially not having a prom or a ring ceremony because this historic pandemic event is the time to make things different which will be a f*ck load more memorable than say my own senior prom, in which I desperately wished while.I.was.actually.there that I wasn't there with my longterm boyfriend at the time who I wanted to break up with but didn't until I got into college.)

I mean, at 46 years of age, if my prom or ring ceremony or graduation actually mattered, I WOULD NEED TO BE SEEING A COUNSELOR. 

I think parents are getting way hung up on a lot of the things that I just don't know that they need to be getting so hung up on right now. 

(I also just finished reading The Poisonwood Bible, and if that novel doesn't make you look at American excess and convenience with a more critical eye, then something is the matter with you.)

Of course, I say all of this fully understanding that I am the people who benefit from American excess and convenience, from an upper-middle-class perspective and part-time employment that allows me tremendous flexibility to assist kids with schoolwork while still doing my stuff. 

That doesn't mean NTI in the spring was always fun or seamless, but it got done. 

And I do think school districts need to think very much outside the box to help kids who don't have home support or who are below grade-level. 

NTI could be an opportunity to micro-focus on the kids who aren't at grade level, perhaps. 

I never consider myself an optimist, and I certainly don't now (especially as it concerns how we're dealing with COVID), but I do think in every situation, there can be positives even in the midst of negatives. 

The best of potentially horrible choices

I don't love online school as a teacher or as a parent, but I think it is the best of many bad options especially for my kids' school district which is about 96,000 kids big.

I think smaller schools can probably more safely manage COVID precautions (although I think the same thing I talk about below can and will happen to them especially since COVID rates are going up).

Let me flesh out what I briefly alluded to in my prior post about N's field hockey team the other day.

A young person went to a Younglife (this is apparently a religious thing) event.
That teenager was waiting on COVID test results.

Yes--that teen and/or that teen's parents thought it was an a-ok idea to go to a public function while waiting on a COVID test.
I think that is called "doing a Rand Paul."

That young person got a positive result the next day, which means every other kid who attended that event is now COVID-exposed, whether they were right up in this kid's face or all the way across the outside area where the event took place, whether they wore masks or not.
COVID exposure can mean nothing serious or everything serious because you just don't know what people's actions are unless you see them with your own eyes.
(And even then, we have under a year's worth of knowledge about this virus so we are flying blind most of the time.)

As I understand it, some of the friends of the 4-5 field hockey girls who attended the event (but did not attend field hockey conditioning) now have to get tested and quarantine because they socialize outside of field hockey and some of them work at a nursing home.
They have to now act out of an abundance of caution because one person made the call to attend a public event while waiting on COVID results.

As far as I'm concerned, if my kids went back to school in person, I would be spending a sizable portion of my time taking them for COVID tests.
And I imagine they would also be having to do much of their school work online anyway because if they got a COVID test, I would then have to quarantine them until we got the results back.
Which means a whole lot of stopping and starting.
Which is EXACTLY the worst thing for the first weeks of school.
It takes most kids like 6 weeks to even get into any kind of routine at the start of the year.

And if the district ultimately decided to do in-person school, kids' educational time would be sacrificed even if they are in the building. 

Because...

--how much waiting time will there be to get temperature checks? If there are 300 kids in a building (lowball figure; my son's elementary has 700 kids; my daughter's high school has 1,400), how long will that take? If there are even half as many kids who opt for in-person school, how long will it take to record temps on 150 kids? Do we line all these kids up 6 feet apart? Where do we line them up? If it is raining, we can't do outside. What do we do with the kids who have fevers? (Since by being in line, they may have already exposed other students?)

(Also, temperature checks don't mean anything, even though every place keeps taking them simply to rule out the people who flagrantly violate the rules and go someplace with a fever.)

--how much waiting time will there be to move students from one area of the building (front door or bus drop off spot) to wherever they are supposed to be in the building? They can't follow social distancing and move kids all at once. How long will kids have to wait in the gym or multi-purpose room while teachers move groups of 5 or 10 kids throughout the building?

--how much waiting time will there be to do restroom breaks? Will there be monitors to do that or will teachers have to stop teaching to monitor? What are the kids doing who are just sitting there? A regular bathroom break takes a minimum of 10 minutes numerous times a day.

--how much waiting time will there be to do lunch? Do cafeteria staff bring it to rooms? What about kids who bring their lunches? Can they go in the halls to lockers to get them? How many can go at once? Then there will be clean-up time in classrooms which will be slower and longer since only a few kids can dispose of stuff to not violate the distancing guidelines.

--how much waiting time will there be to move teachers from one room to another? Kids likely won't be able to change classrooms so teachers will move, which will mean waiting time for kids in classes as they wait for a teacher to come in because they can't be left unsupervised.

--how much waiting time will there be to have kids go to lockers for books? Do they go to lockers? What will teaching kids to use their lockers in middle school be with masks and social distancing? Most kids share lockers. Can that happen now?

--how much waiting time will there be to go outside for recess? Again, there is that movement issue because traveling in a class of 30 kids will not happen. Who cleans the equipment between recesses? Is there wait time for that?

The point here is that the normal "wait" time of school will be magnified to a degree that most parents can't even wrap their heads around because they may not have a clue how long the normal administrative and movement stuff takes on a regular day when there isn't a pandemic.

In-person school will mean parents have an awful lot of stopping and starting work because they have to take their kids to get COVID tests.
And likely have to have them re-tested to prove they are COVID-negative.

In districts like ours that are huge, going back in-person would either require tremendous outlays of money for masks, staff, sanitation, etc or it would require significant outlays of money to use rooms/buildings differently to reduce class sizes by a third (at least).

Our district is a behemoth and something that size can't pivot without a lot of expense and time, which we don't have if we expect our kids to learn something this year.