Freedom can be very addictive.
What will it feel like when these kids are back in school next week? I can’t even imagine. The person I was last February who thought even keeping the kids home one week for the teacher’s strike was a huge imposition doesn’t exist anymore; we’ve all been worn to the nub having to endure things we never could have imagined back then. If nothing else, we are highly adaptable. I picture the end of next week will be a bit like my first week of self-employment after leaving my last 9-5 job at the end of 1999: a bit gluttonous, a bit self-indulgent, a bit lazy and entirely unhinged. It’ll be like stumbling out of a comfortable cave into the cold moonlight. It’s going to take some adjustment.
At the last second we have *probably* been approved for afterschool care; according to our principal, they are working with an outside agency to accommodate all 212 families that requested it. I was emailed application forms and dropped them at the school yesterday. Walking by the school on my daily hike, I can see ominous white tents covering what used to be the basketball courts, reminiscent of the end of E.T. I’m not sure what those will be used for. I also don’t know what my kids’ school days will look like, especially with the added after-hours, which require a commitment of keeping the kids there until 4 PM every day, five days a week. I don’t know when the afterschool care starts. Next week is an enigma.
All I know for sure is Monday the boys have online school for a half hour and then some independent work; I’m preparing to take them on some kind of outdoor adventure for the remainder of the day, probably their favorite skate park that the BF usually takes them to. Then Tuesday Theo goes to school alone starting at 8 AM while Bobby stays home and might have a normal online schedule; then Wednesday Bobby starts. Every night I have to print out a health questionnaire for each boy, and line up for temperature checks and other covid theater to get them into the school building. Before they go back to actual school I have to clean out their backpacks (used only for camping for 13 months) and make sure they have all their supplies and books.
I’ve seen pictures of sad masked kids sitting obediently at plexiglassed socially-distanced desks staring at devices accompanied by articles about how few LAUSD parents are sending their kids back to school this month; I definitely question if I’m doing the right thing. I worry that they’ll hate it or be scared by it; I worry that they’ll say they’re fine but then start doing things like peeing the bed at night or acting out; I’m worried they’ll catch covid despite all the safety measures in place. Bobby admitted on our camping trip that he was scared to go back to school - we did our best to assure him that it’s safe and he won’t get covid, and even if he did he’s a kid so it most likely wouldn’t have any affect on him, and he couldn’t pass it to us because we’re vaccinated. Of course, we won’t be fully vaccinated for five more weeks. And who knows about these variants that are more virulent for children? Will our school be the first one with a major outbreak? It’s the stuff of nightmares.
Still, we’re doing it, because it’s important for these kids to have some semblance of school this year - teachers, other kids, recess. I would hate to think of them missing an entire grade experience. I don’t know why I care about this, but I do. And yes, some time alone during the day would be fabulous. This all falls apart in two months when school ends and I’m back to being the 24/7 caretaker of two young boys again. But we’re traveling so much this summer that there’s no point in trying to arrange summer camps. Not many appear to be open anyway.
Things are looking so grim regarding covid around the world that it’s hard to see the plight of other countries not eventually breaking through our comfortable California bubble; for many places, covid is at its worst right now. My prediction is the US will hit maximum vaccinations at 50-60% of the population; I think crazy conspiracy bullshit, laziness and complacency will forever prevent us from truly reaching herd immunity. Unless private businesses like mine really put our foot down and not allow participation from the unvaccinated, I think by this summer we’re going to find ourselves stuck in this miserable in-between land where we’re subject to endless outbreaks and closures; some of us protected but many not, and those not protected by vaccines slowly chipped away one by one over the next couple of years. It’ll be a bit like AIDS - first a raging death sentence causing the genocide of an entire population; then some treatments start to emerge, then people start to live with it, then preventative medicines start to mean less people catch it, but it’s still here. Covid is ridiculous because anyone (except children) can get vaccinated right now and be done with it, but many still won’t. It makes no sense.
I just hope kids can continue to go to school safely. The idea of everything shuttering again and going back to kids home all day and being trapped...just...no.
Among the list of things I’ve started to plan for my long days to myself are: get a proper bra fitting and unceremoniously throw all my bras in the garbage; freshen up this house with new couch throw pillows and bedding (everything we have reeks of four people not leaving the house for thirteen months - I’m over it); hikes and lunches with friends; shopping just for the sake of shopping; farmer’s markets; resumption of family grocery trips for the first time since March 2020. I have only a few weeks to accomplish all this. Chop chop.
What everything going on in the world will mean for the possibility of my event this year, I just don’t know. I put it at about 50/50 right now. So much can happen either way for California and the US between now and Memorial Day. It’s an infuriating game of chicken. Can we get enough vaccines in arms to outrun the variants? As states - including ours - aggressively come out of hibernation, how can we continue to keep our numbers down, especially when it’s mostly young people out partying who are least likely to bother getting vaccinated? My big fear is that May will come and go and we still won’t have a clear picture of if events will be safe by September (although making it vaccine only pretty much answers that question). I can always open for registration and then cancel if I have to - won’t be the first time. Argh. Who knows??
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