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I’m stressed for a specific reason about which I’m obliged to be vague until some point next week (hopefully), which has been inhibiting my ability to write a coherent journal post. I realise this presumes my usual journal posts are coherent. Shush.
I haven’t been to my place of work since Thursday 19 March. I haven’t driven the car since Friday 20 March. We’ve been attempting to home-school the children whilst simultaneously working from home since Monday 23 March. It’s very difficult to judge how well we’re doing at either of those things. I experience a fairly continuous low-level grade of frustration about nearly every activity I perform. We talk to our friends and colleagues via Zoom, WhatsApp, Messenger, Teams and Skype, depending on which we’re connected on, and which form of technology is being least hinky at the time. Every time Keiki speaks to one of his friends, he has a meltdown afterward because he’s so frustrated. He saw one of his schoolmates on the canal towpath last week. He tried to climb the eight-foot builder’s fence to get to him, and spent their whole conversation clinging to the top of it, shouting every piece of news he could think of to him. After we came inside, he cried for twenty minutes because they couldn’t play together.
I want to do the same when I close a Zoom meeting with a friend.
The weather has been fantastic, which is a blessing because we get to spend a lot of time outside in the garden and that has got to be good for us in many ways. (Also we have a garden, which makes us fortunate.) And yet I futilely resent the weather for being so relentlessly and obliviously nice. Has it not read the latest Financial Times analysis with the terrifying graphs that show how the mortality rates are 50% to 400% higher than they normally are at this point in the year, no matter what a given country or city is reporting as attributable to covid deaths? Dark clouds! Icy pelting rain! Sturm und drang! That’s what’s appropriate right now. Do you not get it, weather? Although if the forecast for the week is correct, I’m about to get what I’m not genuinely asking for here.
I’m trying to be patient, but oh, how I want schools to re-open. I want to go back to work. I want to have a moan with my colleagues about late trains and overpriced bad coffee and inconsiderate fellow commuters. I want to see my friends in person.
If you read that, I’m sorry, and have a duckling photo. If you skipped it, well, I’m still sorry, because you’re probably similarly frustrated. Have a duckling photo.
I haven’t been to my place of work since Thursday 19 March. I haven’t driven the car since Friday 20 March. We’ve been attempting to home-school the children whilst simultaneously working from home since Monday 23 March. It’s very difficult to judge how well we’re doing at either of those things. I experience a fairly continuous low-level grade of frustration about nearly every activity I perform. We talk to our friends and colleagues via Zoom, WhatsApp, Messenger, Teams and Skype, depending on which we’re connected on, and which form of technology is being least hinky at the time. Every time Keiki speaks to one of his friends, he has a meltdown afterward because he’s so frustrated. He saw one of his schoolmates on the canal towpath last week. He tried to climb the eight-foot builder’s fence to get to him, and spent their whole conversation clinging to the top of it, shouting every piece of news he could think of to him. After we came inside, he cried for twenty minutes because they couldn’t play together.
I want to do the same when I close a Zoom meeting with a friend.
The weather has been fantastic, which is a blessing because we get to spend a lot of time outside in the garden and that has got to be good for us in many ways. (Also we have a garden, which makes us fortunate.) And yet I futilely resent the weather for being so relentlessly and obliviously nice. Has it not read the latest Financial Times analysis with the terrifying graphs that show how the mortality rates are 50% to 400% higher than they normally are at this point in the year, no matter what a given country or city is reporting as attributable to covid deaths? Dark clouds! Icy pelting rain! Sturm und drang! That’s what’s appropriate right now. Do you not get it, weather? Although if the forecast for the week is correct, I’m about to get what I’m not genuinely asking for here.
I’m trying to be patient, but oh, how I want schools to re-open. I want to go back to work. I want to have a moan with my colleagues about late trains and overpriced bad coffee and inconsiderate fellow commuters. I want to see my friends in person.
If you read that, I’m sorry, and have a duckling photo. If you skipped it, well, I’m still sorry, because you’re probably similarly frustrated. Have a duckling photo.
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The duck family is very cute!
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Virtual hug, ☕and 🍪.
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I’m used to being at home a lot and being mostly solitary (minus my family) and largely enjoy it, but that we *can’t* have people over for dinner (which we usually did a couple of times a week), that we *can’t* go to the park/etc. when we want to... yeah, it does change the dynamic a bit.
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Yes, it's all kinds of weird and dislocated and ugh. At least Child is old enough to realise the necessity and also quite likes being alone, and H is tiny enough that only us isn't the end of the world for him, he can still make eyes at people on walks and shout at dogs that he's wasn't going to be allowed to pet anyway (although he thinks the rest of the family lives in WhatsApp now and it's going to get interesting when he sees them for real again). But I know my nieces and nephews are finding it incredibly tough.
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I keep having fantasies about train delays and lunch from Pret and moaning about in person meetings being unnecessary.
And I want to touch other human beings again.
Poor Keiki, his response is so understandable. I wish I could do that.
I know of a number of people who have made informal 'pods' with one other household so their children can play together. I think I'd be cautiously making that choice if I had kids. As it is, some friends and I are contemplating cautious flaunting of the letter of the lockdown before we all forget how to talk to other human beings.
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AND I'd like to meet my great nephew.
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I'm sorry this is so hard for you. And your poor boy. It must be so hard for children to understand and if they do really understand, just utterly terrifying.
Also, apparently Scotland is set for two straight weeks of rain so maybe I can send some your way lol Should help keep folk indoors at least....
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The frustration is definitely real, and our sympathies for Keiki's (and your) inability to play with people in actual proximity.
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Can you crank the car and just drive it back and forth around the neighborhood for about 20 miles to charge the battery? They tend to go bad after a while, especially in newer cars that have onboard computers that slowly drain them. I don't wanna throw Something Else To Worry About at you, and you can always buy a new car battery later, but it's just a thing. I need to crank my own and take it out but the weather is about to hit that Sturm und Drang here today. Tomorrow, I guess.
Ducklings!
Also video calls/conferences are fucking exhausting, I don't care what anyone says.
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