Tuesday, April 21, 2020

The curve, work and frustration

Apparently my province has reached it's peak. So what happens next? Do we gradually reopen things and get back to living? Do we remain in this locked down state for another month? or two? or more? Do schools go back soon? Or not until the fall. I am a planner so this uncertainty is frustrating me. It's worse than simply giving a date that is some far off thing. At least then I could make a plan. No plan leaves me feeling un-anchored, and drifting a bit. I am moving forward under a few assumptions, school will not reopen until September, I will be working from home until then, and once things start to get back to normal it will be back to the way things were eventually. That last one is probably in doubt but I am going to believe it.

Work is frustrating, I had not been in the position long when this all came about and have not had a chance to really get a grip on all the pieces of it. So my boss asks me questions I have no answers to, yet I am expected to. I rely heavily on my team, and trust that they are doing what needs to be done. I expect when this is over I will be looking for a different position though, I think I need something a little less anxiety inducing.

I was able to see my parents and sister this past weekend, we met in a grocery store parking lot half way between us. I was picking up my old lap top for Jackson, my dad had fixed it. They had also bought him a bunch of fruit, 3 types of apples, pears and plums, as well as some other snacks. He has been eating a lot of apples everyday. Groceries have been more expensive than they were before, mostly because I can't shop sales like I did. But we are getting by. It is a shift from school lunches though, and one that is frustrating to me, what he would take in a lunch bag he won't eat at home. Before this is all over I have told him we will do a test run day. One day he will pretend I am not home and have to do everything for himself as though I am at work. So we can see if he will be able to stay home at all this summer alone, should that even be an option or possibility.

I am online a lot, perhaps too much. So many people frustrate me so much. There seem to be two camps, those who believe we won't go anywhere until a vaccine is available and those who believe this is all a hoax and we should be getting back to life. The vaccine people actually bother me most, they seem to think we are in isolation to avoid getting this ever, and forget that this was about "flattening the curve" so that hospitals could manage. We will never remain hidden from this forever, we will not be able to avoid living until a vaccine is found. Eventually, the majority of people will get this. We are doing it slowly, so health care can help those who have the bad reactions. I believe until we have testing to see who has actually had it, not just those who are symptomatic and have been tested because of that, we won't have a fulsome picture of it's spread or see the end.

So while I am on one hand scared to get this because I am it for my son, if I cannot make his meals and take care of the house, feed the pets, all of that stuff, then no one will. So if I get sick and it is bad, we are screwed. If he gets it, I am sure he will recover in short order. And on the other hand, perhaps I will be one who has mild or no symptoms. Maybe I already had it, I had some cold like symptoms and tummy issues when we first got locked down, but perhaps that was just stress. Or allergies. Or who the heck knows.

I am planning to be able to travel again, I have two cruises booked in early December and the worst case scenario is we will lose those deposits. I expect that by the time we are supposed to pay in full, we will have a better idea of what is going on and timelines. Best case, we will go away for two weeks and have an amazing time as we always do on cruises. Middle case, we'll have to cancel and reschedule things for another time. I do not expect this to be years in the future, maybe one year? I should perhaps feel bad because I will take him out of school for two weeks. But to be honest, I don't really care any more. He has been doing nothing of his school work, and I am so tired of fighting about it. He'll survive, he'll manage, he'll either figure out that I was right and buckle down, or he'll do something else with his life and it won't matter.

We will live life now though, and enjoy it, because who knows what might happen in the future. This "novel" virus, I am sure it's not the last one we'll have to deal with. Humans have been hell bent on destroying the planet, I am sure it's a matter of time before the planet throws something else at us.

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