The myth of Sisyphus, now more than ever

Today I finally got some initial paperwork for my home refinance. It means nothing - I still don’t have an actual loan in the works, and with the need to have an appraiser come over here, who knows how long this is going to take. I won’t believe anything until (if) I have an actual $200,000 deposit in my bank.

But.

After looking over the proposed terms, payments, etc, I suddenly found myself profoundly cranky and depressed. I feel like I’ve failed, even though none of this is my fault. I did everything right - bought a house, young, in an up-and-coming neighborhood, kept up with the payments and taxes, and when I finally started to make some money put everything I had into paying the house down as fast as possible. My house would have been paid off by 2024. Just four years from now. I would only be 52. I could use the house to pay for these boys to go to any college they want, maybe put down payments on their own houses. I was going to do so much better than my mother, who was a lifetime renter and left us nothing. And now this.

My payments will increase by 150%, and my house won’t be paid off until I’m nearly in my 80s. It’s so fucking depressing I can’t even stand it. And yet this is the thing that will allow us to survive. It’s the only thing that’s going to save us, as all government help has turned out to be lies and cheats. 

I should be grateful I have this equity to rely on. I have it so much better than most. I’m not alone and isolated. I have a partner who has been very helpful and comforting. We have a safe, comfortable place to live, and online schooling, while it sucks, is going. None of us are sick or dying. Our industries will return...someday. Someday I’ll be able to make big payments to try to get this loan back under control. But that day is years away, and in two years I’ll be fifty. I shouldn’t be starting a thirty year loan at my age. It’s madness. And yet, here we are.

I’m hoping once my loan closes - end of May? - I can apply for unemployment. The BF applied yesterday. Anything would help at this point. But I don’t count on those funds still being there a month from now. 

Today I finally broke down and gave Bobby a haircut. Honestly, it worked pretty well. I’ve watched his hair be cut by professionals so many times that I had a sense of the basic techniques - fanning the hair between your fingers and trimming in sections rather than just willy nilly chopping chunks off. Theo’s next. Thankfully my hair can just grow and grow - I have no grays to cover, no nails or lashes or brows or waxing to keep up. Being low maintenance is a blessing right now. There was something about Bobby’s wild, messy, verging on white boy dread lock hair that was starting to highly offend me, the way my kids with food smeared on their faces and hands or toys strewn all over our house offends me - it’s a symbol of my failure as a mother; it’s things being out of control. I’ve already ceded the living room to them - it’s such a mess of forts and legos and game controllers and iPads that I just can’t be buggered to clean it anymore when the very next day it’s just going to be the same; in the evenings the BF and I retreat to our bedroom to watch TV with the cat. I keep the kitchen tidy but it’s a huge amount of work. Constant loading and unloading of the dishwasher, spot cleaning the floor and counters and cabinet fronts, managing our dreadfully overstuffed refrigerator and freezer to make sure nothing is being forgotten and rotting, sweeping the hell hole known as under the table with its repulsive mélange of dropped food, dirt, and cat hair. It is endless. Talk about rolling a stone up a hill just to see it roll all the way back down again.

I was obsessed with the myth of Sisyphus when I was a kid. One thing I never quite got was how he came to accept, even love, the futile task of rolling the stone. Did he just pull up his big girl pants and accept his fate with grim resignation, or did he, much like me and everyone else in this endless quarantine, accept it as a side effect of slowly going mad? Smith comes to love Big Brother at the end of 1984, which I attempted to re-read recently. Is this our fate, so numbed by horror and trauma that we finally just succumb and gleefully drool from toothless mouths because we just don’t know what else to do anymore but laugh at the absurdity of it all? 

No wonder I’m not sleeping well. Jesus. 

Heat wave

The gloomy wet weather has finally lifted for LA and we’re now having a delightful heatwave - 93 degrees today and tomorrow, and 80s for the next week. Which means only one thing: 

I’m taking on the expense of heating the pool every day for now because we just need it. The BF had been taking the kids bike riding every day in the morning, but with so few safe places to go and now the heat, this seems like a better outdoor activity. I will say one thing - having the kids around 24/7 eliminates that low grade panic I always feel when the kids are away; right now I know what they’re doing, eating, etc 100% of the time, and the control freak in me loves this. 

School for Bobby has hit a decent groove - it’s still super convoluted with all the different web sites and log ins and information in fifty different places...but at least there’s a calendar with specific tasks each day, and they’re not too much if you just do the minimum, which of course we do. It still drives me nuts how distractible Bobby is, and how it takes him over an hour to do a math problem...but I’ve found if I sit next to him and make him explain what he’s doing, at least we get through it. Theo’s work is still a bit of a hot mess - the program his teacher uses is very confusing and clunky - so mostly we just don’t do any of it and instead I quiz him on his rainbow words and have him mess around on Khan academy so at least he’s doing something related to learning each day. I hate to say it but I’m kind of used to it now. This is our life for the next eight weeks...might as well lean in. And it’s pretty clear there will be nothing resembling normal school in the fall, either. So here we go.

Here’s my predictions as of today. California is not flattening the curve, not yet. Which we should be. But we’re not. I think any lightening up of restrictions will happen until at least late June to July - and I do believe we’ll see a second wave over the fall and winter. I’m sure I’ll be forced to cancel my event. At this point I’m just waiting on government guidelines and preparing the sequence of events - working it out with the hotel, contacting all staff & vendors, then contacting attendees with refund options, then posting publicly. I can’t do anything until I get my refinance money and that’s at least a month away still. A lot of people have been following my FB page, and more people have texted or private messaged asking my thoughts. It’s on everyone’s mind, what I’m going to do. I hate to make people wait but I have to wait, too. Then once I make the announcement I’ve got 500 people to handle. It’s going to be a huge undertaking, but right now I just wish it was over so I could put it behind me and move on. The limbo is terrible. 

Boop

Out of nowhere my $1000 Economic Injury Grant (loan?) has arrived in my bank account. It was supposed to be “up to” $10,000 - until it was amended to be $1000 per employee. Which sucks. But it’s better than nothing, and I’m grateful for it. Also, new funds for the Payroll Protection program have been approved today, and both banks I applied to asked for documentation so I can get in line. That will get me $10,000. This is all a drop in the bucket compared to what I need tp survive shutting down this year, but it’s all better than nothing. And after last week’s freak out over no results from these loan applications, I’m glad to see some movement. At this moment I’m very glad I formed an LLC and am on payroll so I have lots of very clear documentation that’s easy to get. All of this would be a lot messier if I were still a sole proprietorship.

Right now I am still holding out hope that there will be a way to run my event - testing people as they walk in, for example - assuming the state even allows smaller events like mine by then. It’s a long shot, but a lot can happen in the next couple of months as far as testing, treatments, etc. Even if I have to run a half-full event and take a loss, I can do it - remember, half full is about where my numbers were just a few years ago. The other swing dance event on my weekend reached out to me to ask where my thoughts are right now - I thought they had already canceled, but apparently they haven’t even opened for registration yet. I told them what I’m telling everyone - I’m not deciding until July, unless it’s decided for me. It’s only April. Just sit tight. 

I despair a bit when I see reports of Disneyland being closed possibly until 2022 and schools opening in the fall only doing staggered days/times...I don’t know why this bugs me so much; I should be glad they’re considering opening at all, and even a couple of days of school a week are better than none. But it still bugs me. 

One thing I’m not sad about is knowing that everyone else is grounded, too. There is a certain freedom in not having to be anywhere, in not being obligated to show up for something when you don’t want to. I guess that’s the introvert in me - my life was based around the home anyway, and nightlife was a distant memory due to kids/age. So for once I don’t feel left out. Nobody’s taking awesome trips or getting international gigs or waxing poetic about some amazing dance event they went to that isn’t mine. No, everyone’s at home baking bread (how is everyone eating all this bread? I don’t get it). Everyone is doing what I’m doing - loading and unloading the dishwasher 10,000 times a day and scooping cat hair out of the corners. That’s it. 

Weekend vibes

After Wednesday’s meltdown I decided we needed more time outside, so after some cursory schoolwork we went to the back yard to supposedly play catch with the baseball net, but instead the kids went back inside and put on bathing suits and insisted on swimming in the freezing pool (67 degrees!). Finally I convinced them to go in the hot tub to warm up. It was a pleasant and much needed afternoon.

My BF is freaking out because he hasn’t seen his stimulus check yet, and currently has no income. Sadly I’m sure he’s one of those that falls into the category of people who don’t have direct deposit information with the IRS, so he’s attempting to enter that now, and can’t figure it out and is frustrated, meanwhile I’m sure there’s a check on the way but it could be weeks or months. Today he sat down at the kitchen table and cried. I guess it was his turn to lose it. We’re both pretty schizophrenic at the moment - one day hopeful and upbeat, another at the end of our rope.

For me, the worst has happened - a now very, very slim chance I’ll be able to hold my event this year - so now I just have to adapt to this information. My refi guy called and told me we’re in process, he’s just waiting for the best deal. I told him I want to pull the trigger next week. So at least the refi portion will get started for real then. I asked what were the odds that I won’t be able to get a HELOC or access my equity - he said while things are unusual, it’s extremely unlikely that would happen. So that put me at ease. The good news is if I have to cancel and refund everyone I’m only out all the money I have plus $40,000 - a pittance, really - if I don’t have to pay to run the event, then I can just live on my equity until I open for registration again (maybe in Feb, depending on how things look at that point. Of course if events still aren’t allowed in 2021 that’s another story). I only really need about $60,000 a year to live on; I have $500,000 in equity (although I know I won’t get anywhere near that much). I should still be ok even if I have to refund everyone and even if I can’t run my event this year or next. God I can’t wait until I get my hands on that money so I can stop panicking. 

In the meantime, I’m very much looking forward to the weekend when I don’t have to worry about school work. Not much else to look forward to really. 

Here’s a comparison shot I did of the boys today:

Everything is awful

Today was not a good day. I can feel it in my neck and shoulders, which have ached unbearably pretty much constantly for weeks (gee, I wonder why?). After the governor’s announcement that all California large events are most likely shuttered “until we have a vaccine” - aka, late fall of 2021 or later - well, the floor just dropped out from under me. People keep forwarding me articles about it and I’ve gotten into contentious, bitchy sparring matches on Facebook declaring it insane and unsustainable while being pushed back upon by the “stay at home” crowd with their comfy secure work from home high paying jobs and platinum employer-paid health insurance and no kids so they have plenty of time to bake endless round loaves of artisanal bread and make whipped coffee and organize their closets and isn’t it great we all get to slow down like this and isn’t the LA sky so clear with nobody driving to work???

Fuck them. Fuck them all.

I talked to the hotel on Monday. The whole staff is furloughed until end of May (at least) but I got a very nice lady on the phone who listened to my unfocused ramblings and assured me the hotel would “work with me” whether I’m forced to cancel or have to continue at a reduced attendance...so my fears of being slapped with a giant cancellation fee shouldn’t be a concern. They’re hurting, too - the last thing they want to do is alienate a decades-long customer. I thought as such but it was good to hear. She and I vowed to check in every couple of weeks. 

I was also able to commandeer two school chrome books for the boys - I had originally thought their iPads would work, but they are outdated and useless, and trying to have two boys do school work on my one clunky old laptop is also turning out to be untenable. So after a long, frustrating bout of re-setting up the 8,000 accounts we finally got them both working, and it did make a huge difference. We’re still behind on the work but at least we’re able to do some of it. And they like the technology, so that’s something. 

Yesterday the work went well...today, not so much. After Bobby took over an hour to do one lousy math problem because he was too busy screwing around while I was helping Theo catch up on weeks of ignored math assignments, I snapped at him and he burst into tears. Mother of the year, over here. So I hugged him and apologized and walked him through the problem very patiently. But yeah - the procrastination, the falling over and getting hurt, the constant dropping of pencils, the wanting to see what the brother is doing - it’s all infuriating. I couldn’t deal with making him do any of the work he still had to do after that nor practice violin - I had had it. So that was our night. 

Word is kids won’t be attending school next year at all. I don’t even know what to say to that. 

One thing I’ve been screaming like a crazy person all day on FB is doesn’t anybody realize that living like this is not sustainable? That people are going to snap and start hurting themselves and each other? That you can’t just take away people’s livelihoods and expect them to quietly starve in their homes? Exactly what the fuck do they expect us to do with no income for two fucking years?!?

The problem is, just because I don’t want something to be true doesn’t mean it isn’t. It’s insane, ridiculous, outrageous to me that schools, sporting events, concerts, amusement parks, weddings, any gatherings at all are expected to be closed until 2022. This is insanity. But it’s true. My BF was right months ago when he said that soon we’d be living in a different world. I laughed in his face. How can everything just end? How can normal life as we’ve known it for hundreds of years just end overnight? Well, apparently it can. And all the rage and frustration and incredulity and disgust in the world doesn’t amount to a hill of beans. Just stay home. “Just”. Just watch everything you’ve spent your entire life building be snatched away and just shut up and stay home. And by the way you have a degree in early childhood development now and you’re a full time school teacher to two different grades at once, and you’re working for free and have to buy your own health insurance. Surprise!!! 

So I lie here in my rage and can do nothing but get up tomorrow and do it all over again. Cook and clean up three meals. Scoop cat hair out of the corners with my hands. Struggle through hours of schoolwork. Trim someone’s disgusting black fingernails. Tell them to stop yelling 19,000 times. Do laundry. Rage-scroll FB and decide all of my friends are effete privileged idiots. Read depressing doomsday articles. Check the latest numbers (come on, two million, almost there!!!). Watch something stupid on TV and be amazed by scenes in restaurants like I’m looking at a foreign planet. You know - quarantine stuff.

Will tomorrow be better? Doubtful, when it’s a fasting day for me. Honestly? I may put it off until Friday. Days are meaningless now, and we’re out of my comfort diet food that makes fasting tolerable. I did get a notice that *someone* checked my credit; in googling the name, it was a mortgage company. Does it mean anything? I don’t know; it might just be the mortgage guy doing preliminary paperwork. But it’s a start. If I just had that money I wouldn’t care anymore. But I’m weeks from knowing if that’s even possible. 

Pandemic Easter

Surprisingly, this Easter has been just about like all the others, thanks to having lots of supplies on hand. We did our annual yard Easter egg hunt and the boys got overstuffed Easter baskets; I made buttermilk biscuits for breakfast and we all ate chocolate all day, and the boys made a parkour course out of the couch cushions and then played Minecraft. I’m glad despite all the bad feelings I’ve been having that the kids are largely insulated from the truth of our circumstances. 

And so it goes

Last day of spring break. Boy, am I going to miss this break from school work! Next week is when shit gets real - the workbook packet B came home with on March 13th is done; now it’s all new material, and all on the computer. Thankfully he’s excited about this. He may not be when he sees how much more work he’s actually going to have to do, and how much longer it’s going to take. There’s going to be real accountability now - things that have to be turned in. And as for Theo - his work going forward is a hot mess. Last thing that happened is I reached out to his teacher for a phone conference a week ago. We can’t do much until I hear from her. Still no word from LAUSD about extending school closures, but I expect that announcement Monday. As much as I’m trying to prepare myself, I know that when it’s real it’s going to be a punch in the gut. Some people are saying they’re not going back in the fall, either.

This last sentence fills me with terror, because that means my event will be canceled too. Event cancellations have crept closer and closer to mine, and now finally the one on my same weekend has announced they’re canceling. This is the first time I’m starting to believe that I will have to cancel my event. There are horrible, dire conversations about the future of social dancing and events - that until there are vaccines that our world is over. And we all know vaccines aren’t going to be around for a year and a half. I don’t want to believe this - I can’t believe schools, businesses, restaurants, even Disneyland for fuck’s sake - will be closed for eighteen months. How, exactly, are people supposed to live? 

All of the government help has been downgraded, delayed, and made impossible to get. I’ve given up hoping I’ll get anything from the SBA. 

In one good piece of news, after a month of waiting I’ve finally got my refinance guy to submit an application for me. He has all my paperwork; he says it should take about a month and a half total for the refinance and new HELOC. However, there are no guarantees. The banks may freeze everything. My home equity may plummet. We may not be able to get an appraiser out here. My HELOC may not go through, or if it does, be too low, or even if I get some money available, they may not allow me to access it. So in other words I am not going to count on it. But right now it’s the only hope I have, since all other avenues have dried up and it looks like I really may be stuck with zero income for a year. Or more.

I’ve gone to some very dark places lately. Like, if a world of endless superbugs is what our future is, then there’s no point in living. Yes. I’ve had these thoughts. The future looks very, very dark to me. I am very hopeless. Nobody’s excited about our democratic candidate, and people can’t even vote in primaries because of this virus bullshit. I think realistically we’re looking at a future of no school, no restaurants, no public gatherings, no events, no concerts until at least 2022. Or a maddening push-pull of slowly releasing constrictions - opening restaurants to a few couples at a time, etc - only to clamp back down as cases rise again. I see this going on for years. Which will make it virtually impossible to do just about anything or have any kind of life at all. 

I can’t believe I was on track to have one of my best years yet and literally overnight I’m going to be plunged into abject poverty. I just can’t believe it. It fills me with rage. 

Our lives right now consist of the kids watching inane gamer videos twelve hours a day while I sit in another room and watch tv or nap. It’s not good and it’s not healthy but this is what we’re doing. Good news? The kids think it’s the best thing ever. They laugh and play and enjoy each other’s company and have a blast. I bought them a small trampoline and they bounce on it all day in front of the tv. They love all this. And you know what? I’m glad for them. It’s really best that only one person in this house is experiencing periodic suicidal ideation. And I would never, ever leave them, not in a million years. Would I ponder it from time to time, out of sheer grief and rage and hopelessness? Yes, yes I would. 

I’m still getting up and showering and brushing my teeth and cooking and doing laundry and making the bed and cleaning and making sure the kids get dressed and brush teeth and eat three meals a day and get to bed on time. I’m keeping up my diet and hit one of my goal weights today; five more pounds and I’ll be the lightest I’ve been in several years. I’m still paying my non-working cleaning lady, and will pay my hairdresser this weekend when my appointment should have been. This weekend we’ll do an Easter egg hunt like always, and the boys will get Easter baskets and I may even make little Easter cupcakes. I’ll do all the things, because as a mother you must. I’ll scratch and scrounge for every penny because I know what it is to be poor, I can do poor, I know all about it. I just really thought that miserable life was behind me. Says me and a few million other people right about now. I am so not alone in these feelings. I do take small comfort in that. 

Spring break - kinda

So today ends our homeschooling torture for one week. Bobby’s stuff is *somewhat* sorted - we had a lengthy zoom session with his teacher which was somewhat useless since a) my wifi kept kicking me off and b) the teacher seemed to be as in the dark as we all were, but the one useful piece of information we got from her was that she doesn’t expect all of the work to be done. I think it’s going to be rough going for the first week now that everything is shifting from paper to computer - B is going to have to type everything instead of write, and will have to use an illustrator-type system to write out math problems - I think it’s going to slow us down a lot and have a steep learning curve. But B is excited to use the computer, so anything that makes him actually want to do the work, works for me. Theo’s stuff is still a hot mess. We haven’t been able to do hardly any of the assignments because the app either doesn’t work or they make no sense, and I am filled with terror that he’ll be held back a grade because of it. I tried to get the BF to work with him on it but he was even more frustrated than me and demanded I “ask to speak to the teacher’s supervisor” if she doesn’t get back to us, further proof he has zero understanding of how any of this works. She’s not a fucking retail clerk at Forever 21. Anyway. It was a relief to be able to say to him, “see? Do you see why I’ve been so frustrated and angry the last three weeks? This is my life every day!” He couldn’t even hack it for ten minutes. Sigh. 

I sent an initial inquiry to my bank as soon as they set up their Payroll Protection SBA web page - now I just have to wait for a call, which for all I know could be weeks away. I’m pretty frustrated with all these bail outs I had been hoping for - first the house refinance which I initially thought would be easy and a slam dunk; I haven’t heard from my loan guy in three weeks, and I’m starting to doubt I’ll even be able to refinance at all because literally every homeowner on earth is trying to do the same thing at the same time. Now these SBA loans - which for me are only up to $10,000 so more or less useless - are also so glutted with millions of people applying at the same time that who knows when or if I’ll ever get any money. 

To make matters worse, I got my first refund request the other night. I am in absolute terror of everyone suddenly deciding they’re broke and I’m a good place to get money from, since by Sept they won’t be able to afford to travel to a dance event anyway even if the event goes on. I know I need to prepare myself for lots more to come - it’s inevitable - but it’s really scary. If everyone wants their money back, that’s $100,000. I have $50,000 in the bank. You do the math. 

Speaking of math, I’ve been doing so much of it lately - trying to figure out how to stretch every last dime to make it to next February if this year’s event can’t go on, or if it does. Barring help via refinancing the house or SBA loans there’s no way, especially not if I have to refund even a small amount of attendees. Even half would cost me $50,000 which is every penny I have. Ugh. 

Anyway, I’m relieved to let school work go for a week. These kids happily entertain themselves now, so short of feeding them three times a day and making sure they brush their teeth, my presence is rarely required. On Earth 2 where Clinton won the election and we prepared properly for this pandemic and none of this nightmarish shit happened, I would be arriving in Houston right now ready to sing a wedding and another gig, then in two weeks I’d go to DC, then the next weekend a nice drive up to SLO. Then Amsterdam in May, and a two-week jaunt to Cleveland, NY and Boston in June. All of this is gone. I can’t even think about it, it’s so fucking depressing. My concerns would be getting the kids into a nice summer camp, getting my class schedule together for my event, helping the kids round out their school year. Instead...we’re doing this. I still can’t wrap my head around it.