A Day in the Life - Week 3
As I write, the neighbourhood is busy with people out enjoying the beautiful day. Two girls are skateboarding, two boys on bikes, a couple out walking a dog. A man with a huge telephoto lens strolls by taking pictures. Our front garden is pretty stunning and I often see people stopping to take pictures. No one is breaching the six feet rule, but it does look busy out there. Some masks are being worn - the news today was that the CDC recommends cloth masks if you are going to a public area where social distancing might be difficult - the grocery store or pharmacy. After making the announcement at his briefing, President Trump went on to say he won't be wearing one, but then I doubt he does much shopping.
So here we are, three weeks in to our official 'Shelter-in-home'. Mr Husband has worked from home for a full month! I think I wrote the other day that none of us had been within six feet of another person since March 13, but I was completely forgetting that I have been out three times to medical facilities, most recently on March 26. But those trips actually felt pretty safe because all the personnel I saw were in masks, visors, gloves, and gowns. PPE. All these new acronyms we are learning.
Incidentally, I learned this week that SARS-CoV2 is the name of the virus - the round ball with the little spikey things sticking out - and COVID-19 is the name of the disease caused by the virus. Like the difference between HIV and AIDS. I think I have been using them interchangeably and I apologise - I'll try and get it right from now on!
So what does a day in our life look like now?
The kids disappear into their rooms around 9am to do school for the morning, emerge for lunch, and then whatever they want in the afternoon. ThingTwo is still spending a lot of time in her bed nest, but today she emerged to rollerblade, plant some seeds, and play with the garden hose for a while. ThingOne plays video games and goes for bike rides or skates. Mr H has conference calls in his office or while wandering around the garden. I coordinate online food shopping, write, exercise, do house stuff, talk to Pepper. We congregate in the evening and go for a walk, eat together, maybe ThingOne bakes something. We all stay up a bit too late watching telly or playing a board game. Mr H usually goes back to work - he has been staying up crazy late working - 2 or 3am.
ThingTwo started today with her online school Friday Assembly - a weekly tradition back in normal life that has continued. The teachers had made a video compilation showing what they were doing at home (lots of pajamas and pets). She appeared after about half an hour later and declared she was done with school for the day. A bit more quizzing and it turned out that none of the technology had been working well today and she'd lost patience. This seems to be a common occurance at the moment as the teachers get up to speed with the technology. My current philosophy is to feel pretty chilled out about this whole distance learning thing. In part this is a reaction to the other parents in ThingTwo's class who completely lost their minds on Wednesday night following the news that the schools would stay closed for the rest of the school year.
We have two WhatsApp groups for ThingTwo's class (honestly, I could spend all day just monitoring these groups) - one that includes the teachers and one that is just parents. On the parents-only group one dad posted the question:
"What else can we do to make our kids' education more interactive for the rest of the year with distance learning?"
This unleashed a flood of desperate messages from parents who have been spending several hours a day teaching their kids!!!
"The onus is all on us, it's crazy, we are cooking, cleaning, teaching, working."
"Teaching a 2nd Grader is crazy!"
"We are so stressed!"
"Apparently alcohol sales are up 42% in California. Coincidence?"
In the end they all agreed that one person would email the teacher on behalf of the group with a request that there be more small-group online sessions and maybe some actual 'live' lessons delivered via Zoom. The teacher's response was good I thought - that more interactive sessions were planned but that there was an issue with 'live' online teaching since the District has to ensure equity of access to all classes. A reminder of the real world. I would be surprised if there were families in our district without laptops or Internet at home, but across the state is a different story. The news this week was that Google is stepping in to help by donating 4000 chromebooks and providing free wifi to 100,000 rural households.
I do sympathize with families where all parents need to work at home - must be hellish, particularly with small kids. I've actually been very lucky. Apart from one math freak out by ThingTwo and a 'distance learning sucks' collapse one morning by ThingOne, the kids have been rolling along without much prodding or assistance from me. I certainly haven't been doing any 'teaching' apart from my life skill moments (this week the standouts were the green tea matcha latte, how to cook rice, planting seeds, assembling bird feeders, and looking at ants under the microscope).
But then, I think Mr Husband and I are unusual around here in terms of how little academic pressure we put on the kids. From the panicked reaction of the parents to the end of in-person instruction this school year, I'm guessing they saw plans for their kid to graduate from Stanford shrivel to a community college drop-out... at best. In support of why the school should be providing more content, one parent texted, "Our kids' tutors have switched to Zoom lessons and they have piano, English lessons, 2 hours math, and 2 hours language arts every week and they look forward to it." Gulp! I never cease to be amazed at how the kids around here do so much schooling on top of actual school. No wonder our school Principal is always sending out these plaintive emails saying "Remember, kids need time for unstructured play!"
My feeling is that this whole experience of being 'trapped at home during a global crisis of historic proportions' is going to be character and intelligence building even if they watch the Simpsons, Nailed It! and play Animal Crossing all day! Obviously I'm a huge fan of school, but I also know from experience that there can be unexpected benefits when you shake up kids' routines. Maybe the main outcome of this period will be ThingOne's barista skills and ThingTwo's rollerblading, and I'm ok with that. I think they are also learning to motivate themselves, work independently, problem solve, and to deal with being bored, scared, and lonely. Maybe they are also learning a bit about how to moderate self-indulgence. (God, that sounds puritanical! But it is a useful life-skill!!) But oh dear, I don't know, maybe I should sign them up for six hours of Zoom tutoring each week?
My bird feeder is covered with chickadees, Hutton's vireos, purple finches, and an oak titmouse. And a squirrel has climbed up to scope out the joint. I love the way squirrels seem to think they are invisible when still. This squirrel is planning to launch an attack on the bird feeder and is watching me with its beady little jet-black eyes. Only its tail fluff moves in the breeze. Ha! I outstared it, and it ran up the branches and jumped to the top of another tree. Show off!
I interviewed the kids again today. Different questions. Here's what they had to say:
Why do you like being a kid?
T1: I don't. No, It's ok.
T2: Because I don't have to do grown up stuff like taxes and work.
Mr H: [can't remember - he had a good answer and I'll insert it when we remember]
What advice would you give your parents?
T1: I don't have any you guys have been pretty good. [Me: so diplomatic!]
T2: Maybe sometimes just leave an argument, it may sound ok in your head but think about what is in other people's heads too.
Mr H: That my sister would end up great - after all the difficulties in her teens, that she ended up happy and healthy and with a great family.
If you could be any animal, which one would you be and why?
T1: One that flies because that would be fun.
T2: Horse. Because I love horses.
Mr H: [Long pause - he really thought about this] A whale. Because I love swimming the ocean and I like that 3D feeling and whales have a 3D life.
What would be the ideal allowance? Tell me how you would use it.
T1: I don't really know.
T2: Five or ten dollars each week. I'd just save up a lot of money.
Mr H: Get paid in guitar pedals. But I think I have the ideal allowance right now.
Name something we should do as a family this weekend.
T1: Go out on walk... in a public place... no, no. But if anywhere, snowboarding or skate park. Play a boardgame, bake.
T2: If we weren't stuck in the house, Santa Cruz Boardwalk. But stuck in the house, going in the pool?
Mr H: Play another game - Arboretum or Jump Drive.
What is the grossest thing you can think of?
T1: That is a weird question. Blood. Gory stuff. Someone in PE once time someone fell on their knee and it kind of exploded.
T2: A smooshed banana.
Mr H: I'm not going to say that stuff out loud. I dunno, drinking someone else's vomit.
If there was a song that summed up this staying at home thing, what would it be?
T1: Isolation by Joy Division.
T2: It would be called 'Stupid Coronavirus'. But a real one "Where's me jumper?"
Mr H: A fun time that we had that I'll remember is playing 'Push' with ThingOne - it is a song that we learned to play.
If you could go away anywhere right now where would you go?
T1: To Vancouver.
T2: Anywhere where I could ride a horse on a beach.
Mr H: I'd be sitting at a cafe on a Parisian sidewalk, drinking coffee.
When did you last take a shower?
T1: Day before yesterday
T2: Monday maybe?
Mr H: Hmm... can't remember.
When did you last wear real clothes?
T1: Yesterday - I wore jeans.
T2: Yesterday!
Mr H: Day before yesterday.
Here is our 'Pandemix' Playlist so far:
Isolation - Joy Division
Where's my jumper? - Sultans of Ping F.C. (Terrible song but makes ThingTwo laugh so much)
Push - The cure
Feel Good Inc. - Gorillaz (been playing this around the house a lot)
On Melancholy Hill - Gorillaz "You are my medicine when you are close to me..."
Humility - Gorillaz "Calling the world from isolation..."
(all these Gorillaz songs have awesome videos)
Guess I'm Doing Fine - Beck
Shout - Tears for Fears (to play when ordering food online, the line "These are the things you can do without" is especially useful)
Let it go - Frozen soundtrack (to play when worrying about screen time, kids future, our future...)
So here we are, three weeks in to our official 'Shelter-in-home'. Mr Husband has worked from home for a full month! I think I wrote the other day that none of us had been within six feet of another person since March 13, but I was completely forgetting that I have been out three times to medical facilities, most recently on March 26. But those trips actually felt pretty safe because all the personnel I saw were in masks, visors, gloves, and gowns. PPE. All these new acronyms we are learning.
Incidentally, I learned this week that SARS-CoV2 is the name of the virus - the round ball with the little spikey things sticking out - and COVID-19 is the name of the disease caused by the virus. Like the difference between HIV and AIDS. I think I have been using them interchangeably and I apologise - I'll try and get it right from now on!
So what does a day in our life look like now?
The kids disappear into their rooms around 9am to do school for the morning, emerge for lunch, and then whatever they want in the afternoon. ThingTwo is still spending a lot of time in her bed nest, but today she emerged to rollerblade, plant some seeds, and play with the garden hose for a while. ThingOne plays video games and goes for bike rides or skates. Mr H has conference calls in his office or while wandering around the garden. I coordinate online food shopping, write, exercise, do house stuff, talk to Pepper. We congregate in the evening and go for a walk, eat together, maybe ThingOne bakes something. We all stay up a bit too late watching telly or playing a board game. Mr H usually goes back to work - he has been staying up crazy late working - 2 or 3am.
 |
| Pie from scratch. Was delish. |
 |
| Like Christmas morning! Food delivery on the front doorstep! |
ThingTwo started today with her online school Friday Assembly - a weekly tradition back in normal life that has continued. The teachers had made a video compilation showing what they were doing at home (lots of pajamas and pets). She appeared after about half an hour later and declared she was done with school for the day. A bit more quizzing and it turned out that none of the technology had been working well today and she'd lost patience. This seems to be a common occurance at the moment as the teachers get up to speed with the technology. My current philosophy is to feel pretty chilled out about this whole distance learning thing. In part this is a reaction to the other parents in ThingTwo's class who completely lost their minds on Wednesday night following the news that the schools would stay closed for the rest of the school year.
We have two WhatsApp groups for ThingTwo's class (honestly, I could spend all day just monitoring these groups) - one that includes the teachers and one that is just parents. On the parents-only group one dad posted the question:
"What else can we do to make our kids' education more interactive for the rest of the year with distance learning?"
This unleashed a flood of desperate messages from parents who have been spending several hours a day teaching their kids!!!
"The onus is all on us, it's crazy, we are cooking, cleaning, teaching, working."
"Teaching a 2nd Grader is crazy!"
"We are so stressed!"
"Apparently alcohol sales are up 42% in California. Coincidence?"
In the end they all agreed that one person would email the teacher on behalf of the group with a request that there be more small-group online sessions and maybe some actual 'live' lessons delivered via Zoom. The teacher's response was good I thought - that more interactive sessions were planned but that there was an issue with 'live' online teaching since the District has to ensure equity of access to all classes. A reminder of the real world. I would be surprised if there were families in our district without laptops or Internet at home, but across the state is a different story. The news this week was that Google is stepping in to help by donating 4000 chromebooks and providing free wifi to 100,000 rural households.
 |
| Distance learning. |
I do sympathize with families where all parents need to work at home - must be hellish, particularly with small kids. I've actually been very lucky. Apart from one math freak out by ThingTwo and a 'distance learning sucks' collapse one morning by ThingOne, the kids have been rolling along without much prodding or assistance from me. I certainly haven't been doing any 'teaching' apart from my life skill moments (this week the standouts were the green tea matcha latte, how to cook rice, planting seeds, assembling bird feeders, and looking at ants under the microscope).
But then, I think Mr Husband and I are unusual around here in terms of how little academic pressure we put on the kids. From the panicked reaction of the parents to the end of in-person instruction this school year, I'm guessing they saw plans for their kid to graduate from Stanford shrivel to a community college drop-out... at best. In support of why the school should be providing more content, one parent texted, "Our kids' tutors have switched to Zoom lessons and they have piano, English lessons, 2 hours math, and 2 hours language arts every week and they look forward to it." Gulp! I never cease to be amazed at how the kids around here do so much schooling on top of actual school. No wonder our school Principal is always sending out these plaintive emails saying "Remember, kids need time for unstructured play!"
My feeling is that this whole experience of being 'trapped at home during a global crisis of historic proportions' is going to be character and intelligence building even if they watch the Simpsons, Nailed It! and play Animal Crossing all day! Obviously I'm a huge fan of school, but I also know from experience that there can be unexpected benefits when you shake up kids' routines. Maybe the main outcome of this period will be ThingOne's barista skills and ThingTwo's rollerblading, and I'm ok with that. I think they are also learning to motivate themselves, work independently, problem solve, and to deal with being bored, scared, and lonely. Maybe they are also learning a bit about how to moderate self-indulgence. (God, that sounds puritanical! But it is a useful life-skill!!) But oh dear, I don't know, maybe I should sign them up for six hours of Zoom tutoring each week?
My bird feeder is covered with chickadees, Hutton's vireos, purple finches, and an oak titmouse. And a squirrel has climbed up to scope out the joint. I love the way squirrels seem to think they are invisible when still. This squirrel is planning to launch an attack on the bird feeder and is watching me with its beady little jet-black eyes. Only its tail fluff moves in the breeze. Ha! I outstared it, and it ran up the branches and jumped to the top of another tree. Show off!
I interviewed the kids again today. Different questions. Here's what they had to say:
Why do you like being a kid?
T1: I don't. No, It's ok.
T2: Because I don't have to do grown up stuff like taxes and work.
Mr H: [can't remember - he had a good answer and I'll insert it when we remember]
What advice would you give your parents?
T1: I don't have any you guys have been pretty good. [Me: so diplomatic!]
T2: Maybe sometimes just leave an argument, it may sound ok in your head but think about what is in other people's heads too.
Mr H: That my sister would end up great - after all the difficulties in her teens, that she ended up happy and healthy and with a great family.
If you could be any animal, which one would you be and why?
T1: One that flies because that would be fun.
T2: Horse. Because I love horses.
Mr H: [Long pause - he really thought about this] A whale. Because I love swimming the ocean and I like that 3D feeling and whales have a 3D life.
What would be the ideal allowance? Tell me how you would use it.
T1: I don't really know.
T2: Five or ten dollars each week. I'd just save up a lot of money.
Mr H: Get paid in guitar pedals. But I think I have the ideal allowance right now.
Name something we should do as a family this weekend.
T1: Go out on walk... in a public place... no, no. But if anywhere, snowboarding or skate park. Play a boardgame, bake.
T2: If we weren't stuck in the house, Santa Cruz Boardwalk. But stuck in the house, going in the pool?
Mr H: Play another game - Arboretum or Jump Drive.
What is the grossest thing you can think of?
T1: That is a weird question. Blood. Gory stuff. Someone in PE once time someone fell on their knee and it kind of exploded.
T2: A smooshed banana.
Mr H: I'm not going to say that stuff out loud. I dunno, drinking someone else's vomit.
If there was a song that summed up this staying at home thing, what would it be?
T1: Isolation by Joy Division.
T2: It would be called 'Stupid Coronavirus'. But a real one "Where's me jumper?"
Mr H: A fun time that we had that I'll remember is playing 'Push' with ThingOne - it is a song that we learned to play.
If you could go away anywhere right now where would you go?
T1: To Vancouver.
T2: Anywhere where I could ride a horse on a beach.
Mr H: I'd be sitting at a cafe on a Parisian sidewalk, drinking coffee.
When did you last take a shower?
T1: Day before yesterday
T2: Monday maybe?
Mr H: Hmm... can't remember.
When did you last wear real clothes?
T1: Yesterday - I wore jeans.
T2: Yesterday!
Mr H: Day before yesterday.
Here is our 'Pandemix' Playlist so far:
Isolation - Joy Division
Where's my jumper? - Sultans of Ping F.C. (Terrible song but makes ThingTwo laugh so much)
Push - The cure
Feel Good Inc. - Gorillaz (been playing this around the house a lot)
On Melancholy Hill - Gorillaz "You are my medicine when you are close to me..."
Humility - Gorillaz "Calling the world from isolation..."
(all these Gorillaz songs have awesome videos)
Guess I'm Doing Fine - Beck
Shout - Tears for Fears (to play when ordering food online, the line "These are the things you can do without" is especially useful)
Let it go - Frozen soundtrack (to play when worrying about screen time, kids future, our future...)
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