Not.
I woke up today hoping that this was a big joke. Not really. But after reflecting on how things are going/have been going in our house the last few weeks, I am starting to re-prioritize. And I think the focus is going to be on just making it through this with my sanity in place.
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Fun with post it notes earlier this week.
I was supposed to be working. |
Want to know how it's going? Let's review the goals I set for myself a week or two ago . . .
1. Two hours of dedicated work time every day so that I can stay on top of my teaching. That's reasonable, right? The College is paying me for 12 contact hours per week. Two hours per day, six days a week is manageable while I run the household and "teach" my kid, right? Um - I have lost count of how many times I've been interrupted during those two hours I blocked out for myself. Either by another person or by the freaking internet crapping out on me. And also - my students don't seem to have chosen the same two hours as me to work each day - and neither have my colleagues. How wacky that they want to work on their own schedules?? Lesson learned - the work will get done. Maybe it's in a six hour block on a Saturday. That's why there are seven days in a week.
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| Follow the rules, folks. Back up. |
2. Healthy meals planned out in advance, using the ingredients that we have on hand because I was a good girl and waited in line for an hour at the grocery store right before the bottom fell out of this ride. I went to the grocery store yesterday to pick up a rotisserie chicken (because I don't own a rotisserie, and the chicken I had was frozen and wouldn't thaw in time for me to cook it for dinner, but chicken was on the menu so I couldn't deviate) and some lettuce (because we always have a salad with the rotisserie chicken and that's what I needed to feel "normal" yesterday). I ended up spending $230 on other things that we will definitely eat, but really didn't need. My stockpile is FINE now - stop buying groceries. Dinner was delicious though. Everyone except the kid thought so. He ate the peas out of sugar snap peas, a carrot stick, and three pieces of bread. He is not a toddler. He just doesn't feel well. Lesson learned - we will not starve. It doesn't matter if we eat nachos for dinner a couple times a week. How fortunate are we that we
can eat nachos twice a week if we want/need to.
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| He made it to the top. And back down. |
3. I'm a teacher - so "homeschooling" will be a breeze! I don't even know where to start with this one. And I think I need to quit comparing myself to others over this topic. I can't get mine to create a to do list and stick to it. I can't get mine to sit still. I can't teach mine. BUT - he will sit and read a book from start to finish in one sitting (is it the one the school require? No. But he's reading.). He can talk logic puzzles with my husband for hours. He does math conversions for recipes in his head quickly. He gets jokes in movies that many adults labor over. He thinks the fitness challenges set forth by the school are dumb. But he'll go for a walk with me for an hour without complaint. He'll climb trees for as many hours as we'll let him. Lesson learned - it's okay if he doesn't learn the periodic table this year. He's only in grade 5 . . . his future is plenty bright. It. Will. All. Be. Okay. Chill the F out about his schoolwork. He wants to be a police officer, not a chemist, so he doesn't even need to know the periodic table, honestly.
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This was the line at the grocery store when I did my
curbside pickup last week. At 4 pm. |
4. We will wake up and be ready for the day by 8 and have reasonable bedtimes after following my "structure" for the day which is two hour blocks for work or play with an hour for lunch. Ha! I mean, we're generally following that structure, but the oldest one is still asleep and the youngest one just got up. I've been up since 7:30 with my face in a screen. The carcass from last night's chicken is still in the crock pot (I had to heat it up because I went to the grocery store at 9am - which is a genius plan by the way because there was no line snaked around the building and everyone working was pleasant. I highly recommend the early grocery trip if you must go. If you don't need to go - please stay home.) Lesson learned - be okay with mediocre. You're not a hoarder, your house is generally clean. It's okay if you left a carcass out overnight. It can go in the garbage today. After your coffee.
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Read this last week.
It's true - the sun came out today. |
5. We will follow the rules about staying home and keep ourselves and everyone else healthy. We have done just that. Other than my solo trips out to the grocery store, we are generally staying inside. We go for long family walks, sometimes two, each day. But we still got touched by sickness. The youngest one has had a cough for the last two weeks and a headache for three. We're assuming it's
the virus and treating it as such, on the recommendation of our family doc. I don't want to use up a test that could be used on someone else, and we don't want to take up the time of our health care workers who were stressed out before this all started. Lesson learned - everyone is at risk and it's not your fault. No one is perfect and your kid isn't likely to die. So let go of the little things that are niggling at your brain. Take advantage of the time you have to read and do a puzzle and really talk with your husband. Let your kid snuggle a little longer than is comfortable (he has VERY pointy joints!) because he's ten already and there is an end to this soon. There will come a time when he doesn't lean in for a hug fifty gagillion times a day.
Enjoy the morning coffee, kiss your husband (on the cheek, and then wash your face), and practice relaxing. Your neck and shoulders will appreciate it. And that's no joke.
