Day in the life - Week 5
We've been at home for five weeks now. I think that must be the longest we've ever been all together as a family, all day, every day, in one location. If there is a silver lining, it is that under normal circumstances we would never have this rare time together.
Over the last week or so there has been a lot of talk about 'how do we come out of lockdown?' The Governor of California, Gavin Newsom, who is, I think, handling the situation pretty well so far, said, "If we're ultimately going to come back economically, the worst mistake we can make is making a precipitous decision based on politics and frustration that puts people's lives at risk and ultimately sets back the cause of economic growth and economic recovery." On Tuesday he laid out a 'health-based' framework that needs to be in place before California will ease shelter-in-place:
1. availability of widespread testing and tracking,
2. ability to monitor vulnerable populations,
3. hospital equipment shortages addressed,
4. successful therapeutics for COVID-19,
5. rethinking layouts of businesses, schools, and childcare facilities to enable social distancing, and
6. a system in place to allow the state to toggle back and forth easily between stricter and looser controls.
About life in the near future, the Governor painted a picture where there would be no mass gatherings, businesses like restaurants may open but with strict social distancing measures, and face masks would become mandatory in public. He said, "Normal it will not be, at least until we have herd immunity and we have a vaccine."
So the message, if you ignore tweets from a certain person and the moronic 'liberation' protests, seems clear: stay the course and if we all do this for long enough there is a possible road out of here. A pretty bleak outlook, but I can't see an alternative.
But here's the thing.
This past week it began to feel like people were starting to relax the rules a bit.
From talking with friends in other cities around the Bay Area and also in Canada, I've heard that kids from different families are being allowed to play together. First hand I saw some kids from two families all playing together with water guns on a recent hot day. Someone posted to our city's community email group that kids are playing in playgrounds (schools, parks, and playgrounds have all been closed off with tape for a few weeks now), and families seem to be shopping together at grocery stores (here only one person per family is supposed to go to the store once a week).
Donald G. McNeil in the New York Times wrote this week: "Compared with China or Italy, the United States is still a playground. Americans can take domestic flights, drive where they want, and roam streets and parks. Despite restrictions, everyone seems to know someone discreetly arranging play dates for children, holding backyard barbecues or meeting people on dating apps. Partly as a result, the country has seen up to 30,000 new case infections each day. "
Maybe it was too soon to talk about the way out of lockdown - maybe it led people to feel that the danger from the 'Invisible Enemy' (Trump's words) has receded?
I wonder if I would be letting the kids play with friends if we were still living in that dense Canadian neighbourhood up on our little mountain in British Columbia?
In our current neighbourhood it isn't an issue. Even before the virus, this was a fairly 'socially distanced' neighbourhood. People drive in and drive out. It was never the kind of neighbourhood where kids just drop by. Over the last 18 months I have often been sad about this lack of community since the kids have been quite lonely at times. But right now I'm relieved. We haven't had to tackle kids showing up at our door to play.
I'm not sure how I feel when I hear about people easing up on the restrictions.
Well, that's not true.
I do know what I think.
I've been pretty angry about it for a few days.
The tricky part is that it isn't just anonymous 'people' that I'm hearing about on podcasts or reading about in the media. This is good friends who are not particularly libertarian, are very well educated, and usually seem to have a healthy amount of paranoia. So I find it really strange that these sane, well-adjusted people are ignoring science and rationalizing bending the social distancing rules. And for what? To let their kids have play dates! Early on in this crisis reporters talked about how one of the biggest threats to containing the virus in America might be that a lot of people don't have health insurance, so they would avoid going to hospital and would work when sick. Turns out the biggest threat may instead be the upper middle class play date!
My judgemental reaction this week has got me re-evaluating some of the grey areas in our current situation - my going over to pick up food from a friend, Mr Husband making a non-essential trip to a hardware store (to get paint brushes to paint a skate ramp he built with ThingOne). I'm finding that I've started to read about the virus more frequently again. I want concrete evidence-based advice. Some of the fear that was around five weeks ago is creeping back.
During Lady Gaga's healthcare workers thank-a-thon 'One World: Together at Home' on Saturday some celebrity or other, or perhaps it was a WHO or UN official or doctor - they all looked equally glamorous - said, 'Coronavirus anywhere is coronavirus everywhere'.
I can see how easy it is to let things slip, to make exceptions, to find a way to rationalize the convenient decision. But as more research results come in - high numbers of asymptomatic cases, of how long the virus lives on surfaces, models of second waves - nothing but maintaining an extremely cautious approach to the outside world makes any sense.
I have found a simple cure - a sort of shock therapy - to any feelings of wanting to relax the rules - both those ordered by public health officials and my somewhat nutty self-imposed routines around grocery washing and package quarantining. First, I check the Santa Clara County Public Health COVID-19 dashboard's 'Death Data'. The stats that always brings me up short are that 86% of the deaths in our county have had one or more underlying health conditions, and 91% of deaths were people over fifty, peaking at the 71-80 age range. If that doesn't quite do the job, I read a first-hand account such as a COVID-19 survivor's story. Or an ER doctor's account of the pandemic 'engulfing' New York's hospitals. And finally round it off with some science reality checks - the podcast 'Science Vs.' has been good lately.
Ok. Rant over. Here are our interviews from last week. I recorded these interviews after dinner on Friday. Everyone got to think of two questions. I think we'll enjoy listening back to these recordings once the kids are grown! ThingTwo was the interviewer once again.
T2: Ok. It is... [looks at wall calendar]. April 17... wait is it April? Wow! Ok. Mum first. Describe your ideal house to live in.
Me: It would be a bungalow in the desert with glass walls and great views.
T2: What is your ideal pet?
Me: Pepper! [our cat]
T2: Fleas?
Me: No thanks.
T2: Knees?
Me: Pain.
T2: Ducks?
Me: Feathers.
T2: How many people would you want in your dream family? [her question!]
Me: Four. No wait let me think again. Just me! [laughter] Only kidding!
T2: What is the last book you read?
Me: Olive Again by Elizabeth Strout
T2: What book would you have liked to have written?
Me: The Tiger Who Came to Tea. By Judith Kerr.
T2: I love that book. Ok. Thank you. My turn.
My ideal house would be a bunch of horses in Canada in a farm near ice skating so I can ice skate also with a ramp so I can roller skate also and a lot of horses and a lot of saddles.
What is my ideal pet? Pepper. And also many many many horses. And also a few pugs and ferrets and two lions.
Fleas? I hate them.
Knees? I love them.
Ducks. Love them too. Oh wait, I want two ducks and three goats for my pets.
In my family I want four.
The last book I read was This Book is a Secret.
I would love to have written Hamilton.
T2: Ok. Dad. What is your ideal house to live in?
Mr H: Same as mum, well, no maybe I have two - a house in the desert with views of the mountains or a cabin in the woods.
T2: What is your ideal pet?
Mr H: Well in addition to Pepper it would also be a dog who would do that that thing where when you come home it nearly dies of excitement.
T2: Fleas?
Mr H: Fleas, knees and ducks - I would put them in an arena to fight.
T2: How many people would you want in a family? That is not this family.
Mr H: Three. [Big laffs.]
T2: What is the last book you read?
Mr H: How to dispose of one of your family members.
T2: That's very un-nice.
Mr H: No, no, ok, I'm reading a book by Don Ayles who worked on the software for the Apollo Lunar Module - it is called Starburst and Luminary.
T2: What is a book you wish you had written?
Mr H: A book I wish I'd written for artistic reasons is Wonder Boys by Michael Chabon. I love that book and wish I'd been brilliant enough to write it. And I wish I'd written a book that sold as many copies as Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone.
T2: Now ThingOne. Describe an ideal house you would like to live in.
T1: You know in The Office [TV show - US version] where Jim is talking about his dream house - it is on a hill and he kayaks to his job at the bike shop or bikes to his job at the kayak shop, and that's it.
T2: What is your ideal pet?
T1: Um. Pepper because he's cool.
T2: Ok. Fleas. Knees. Ducks?
T1: Fleas. Can't say I hate them that much, you know, don't have experience.
Ducks, they are cool.
T2: Knees?
T1: Knees, um, they've worked for me.
T2: How many people would you want in a family?
T1: Two to four.
T2: Ok. What is the last book you read?
T1: Uh, trying to think, um, that skate book. The one I got for Christmas.
T2: What book would you have liked to have written?
T1: A Roald Dahl book - maybe Boy because I liked that a lot when I was small.
So that's it for week five! Apologies that this went out half-way into week six!
Over the last week or so there has been a lot of talk about 'how do we come out of lockdown?' The Governor of California, Gavin Newsom, who is, I think, handling the situation pretty well so far, said, "If we're ultimately going to come back economically, the worst mistake we can make is making a precipitous decision based on politics and frustration that puts people's lives at risk and ultimately sets back the cause of economic growth and economic recovery." On Tuesday he laid out a 'health-based' framework that needs to be in place before California will ease shelter-in-place:
1. availability of widespread testing and tracking,
2. ability to monitor vulnerable populations,
3. hospital equipment shortages addressed,
4. successful therapeutics for COVID-19,
5. rethinking layouts of businesses, schools, and childcare facilities to enable social distancing, and
6. a system in place to allow the state to toggle back and forth easily between stricter and looser controls.
About life in the near future, the Governor painted a picture where there would be no mass gatherings, businesses like restaurants may open but with strict social distancing measures, and face masks would become mandatory in public. He said, "Normal it will not be, at least until we have herd immunity and we have a vaccine."
So the message, if you ignore tweets from a certain person and the moronic 'liberation' protests, seems clear: stay the course and if we all do this for long enough there is a possible road out of here. A pretty bleak outlook, but I can't see an alternative.
But here's the thing.
This past week it began to feel like people were starting to relax the rules a bit.
From talking with friends in other cities around the Bay Area and also in Canada, I've heard that kids from different families are being allowed to play together. First hand I saw some kids from two families all playing together with water guns on a recent hot day. Someone posted to our city's community email group that kids are playing in playgrounds (schools, parks, and playgrounds have all been closed off with tape for a few weeks now), and families seem to be shopping together at grocery stores (here only one person per family is supposed to go to the store once a week).
Donald G. McNeil in the New York Times wrote this week: "Compared with China or Italy, the United States is still a playground. Americans can take domestic flights, drive where they want, and roam streets and parks. Despite restrictions, everyone seems to know someone discreetly arranging play dates for children, holding backyard barbecues or meeting people on dating apps. Partly as a result, the country has seen up to 30,000 new case infections each day. "
Maybe it was too soon to talk about the way out of lockdown - maybe it led people to feel that the danger from the 'Invisible Enemy' (Trump's words) has receded?
I wonder if I would be letting the kids play with friends if we were still living in that dense Canadian neighbourhood up on our little mountain in British Columbia?
In our current neighbourhood it isn't an issue. Even before the virus, this was a fairly 'socially distanced' neighbourhood. People drive in and drive out. It was never the kind of neighbourhood where kids just drop by. Over the last 18 months I have often been sad about this lack of community since the kids have been quite lonely at times. But right now I'm relieved. We haven't had to tackle kids showing up at our door to play.
I'm not sure how I feel when I hear about people easing up on the restrictions.
Well, that's not true.
I do know what I think.
I've been pretty angry about it for a few days.
The tricky part is that it isn't just anonymous 'people' that I'm hearing about on podcasts or reading about in the media. This is good friends who are not particularly libertarian, are very well educated, and usually seem to have a healthy amount of paranoia. So I find it really strange that these sane, well-adjusted people are ignoring science and rationalizing bending the social distancing rules. And for what? To let their kids have play dates! Early on in this crisis reporters talked about how one of the biggest threats to containing the virus in America might be that a lot of people don't have health insurance, so they would avoid going to hospital and would work when sick. Turns out the biggest threat may instead be the upper middle class play date!
My judgemental reaction this week has got me re-evaluating some of the grey areas in our current situation - my going over to pick up food from a friend, Mr Husband making a non-essential trip to a hardware store (to get paint brushes to paint a skate ramp he built with ThingOne). I'm finding that I've started to read about the virus more frequently again. I want concrete evidence-based advice. Some of the fear that was around five weeks ago is creeping back.
During Lady Gaga's healthcare workers thank-a-thon 'One World: Together at Home' on Saturday some celebrity or other, or perhaps it was a WHO or UN official or doctor - they all looked equally glamorous - said, 'Coronavirus anywhere is coronavirus everywhere'.
I can see how easy it is to let things slip, to make exceptions, to find a way to rationalize the convenient decision. But as more research results come in - high numbers of asymptomatic cases, of how long the virus lives on surfaces, models of second waves - nothing but maintaining an extremely cautious approach to the outside world makes any sense.
I have found a simple cure - a sort of shock therapy - to any feelings of wanting to relax the rules - both those ordered by public health officials and my somewhat nutty self-imposed routines around grocery washing and package quarantining. First, I check the Santa Clara County Public Health COVID-19 dashboard's 'Death Data'. The stats that always brings me up short are that 86% of the deaths in our county have had one or more underlying health conditions, and 91% of deaths were people over fifty, peaking at the 71-80 age range. If that doesn't quite do the job, I read a first-hand account such as a COVID-19 survivor's story. Or an ER doctor's account of the pandemic 'engulfing' New York's hospitals. And finally round it off with some science reality checks - the podcast 'Science Vs.' has been good lately.
Ok. Rant over. Here are our interviews from last week. I recorded these interviews after dinner on Friday. Everyone got to think of two questions. I think we'll enjoy listening back to these recordings once the kids are grown! ThingTwo was the interviewer once again.
T2: Ok. It is... [looks at wall calendar]. April 17... wait is it April? Wow! Ok. Mum first. Describe your ideal house to live in.
Me: It would be a bungalow in the desert with glass walls and great views.
T2: What is your ideal pet?
Me: Pepper! [our cat]
T2: Fleas?
Me: No thanks.
T2: Knees?
Me: Pain.
T2: Ducks?
Me: Feathers.
T2: How many people would you want in your dream family? [her question!]
Me: Four. No wait let me think again. Just me! [laughter] Only kidding!
T2: What is the last book you read?
Me: Olive Again by Elizabeth Strout
T2: What book would you have liked to have written?
Me: The Tiger Who Came to Tea. By Judith Kerr.
T2: I love that book. Ok. Thank you. My turn.
My ideal house would be a bunch of horses in Canada in a farm near ice skating so I can ice skate also with a ramp so I can roller skate also and a lot of horses and a lot of saddles.
What is my ideal pet? Pepper. And also many many many horses. And also a few pugs and ferrets and two lions.
Fleas? I hate them.
Knees? I love them.
Ducks. Love them too. Oh wait, I want two ducks and three goats for my pets.
In my family I want four.
The last book I read was This Book is a Secret.
I would love to have written Hamilton.
T2: Ok. Dad. What is your ideal house to live in?
Mr H: Same as mum, well, no maybe I have two - a house in the desert with views of the mountains or a cabin in the woods.
T2: What is your ideal pet?
Mr H: Well in addition to Pepper it would also be a dog who would do that that thing where when you come home it nearly dies of excitement.
T2: Fleas?
Mr H: Fleas, knees and ducks - I would put them in an arena to fight.
T2: How many people would you want in a family? That is not this family.
Mr H: Three. [Big laffs.]
T2: What is the last book you read?
Mr H: How to dispose of one of your family members.
T2: That's very un-nice.
Mr H: No, no, ok, I'm reading a book by Don Ayles who worked on the software for the Apollo Lunar Module - it is called Starburst and Luminary.
T2: What is a book you wish you had written?
Mr H: A book I wish I'd written for artistic reasons is Wonder Boys by Michael Chabon. I love that book and wish I'd been brilliant enough to write it. And I wish I'd written a book that sold as many copies as Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone.
T2: Now ThingOne. Describe an ideal house you would like to live in.
T1: You know in The Office [TV show - US version] where Jim is talking about his dream house - it is on a hill and he kayaks to his job at the bike shop or bikes to his job at the kayak shop, and that's it.
T2: What is your ideal pet?
T1: Um. Pepper because he's cool.
T2: Ok. Fleas. Knees. Ducks?
T1: Fleas. Can't say I hate them that much, you know, don't have experience.
Ducks, they are cool.
T2: Knees?
T1: Knees, um, they've worked for me.
T2: How many people would you want in a family?
T1: Two to four.
T2: Ok. What is the last book you read?
T1: Uh, trying to think, um, that skate book. The one I got for Christmas.
T2: What book would you have liked to have written?
T1: A Roald Dahl book - maybe Boy because I liked that a lot when I was small.
So that's it for week five! Apologies that this went out half-way into week six!
 |
| Pepper: the ideal pet! |
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