Tuesday-Friday, Day #73-76 of Phase 2 of Reopening
We request continued prayers for my husband's mother D. She is recovering, now in a long-term, acute care facility, from COVID-19 and hasn't been home in eight weeks. We value communicating with her via FaceTime as often as the facility will facilitate, which is almost every day.
1. Memorial Day Monday
We went hiking and had a great time! Click here to read about it.
2. Stress
I've let myself get too stressed out this week preparing for Joseph's First Holy Communion, guests visiting our home, and trying to keep up with my daily walking, our school routine, and music practice. How to juggle it all while maintaining peace and trust in God is a lifetime endeavor for me!
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| A rabbit spotted on my morning walk and seen often in my yard |
3. Summer School
We are chugging away at our summer school routine and I think the children are getting their sea legs. That said, I am failing miserably about doing a daily 45 minutes or so of school with my first grader who still needs me sitting with him for everything.
I'm so glad my four-year-old takes matters into his own hands when I'm too busy to guide him! I think getting down this learn-to-draw book and drawing an airplane is pretty wonderful for a boy not yet five!
4. Reading Aloud
After much debate and my starting to read aloud Shadows on the Rock by Willa Cather . . .
. . . we actually switched over to Pudd'nhead Wilson (1894) by Mark Twain, which I read for the first time about a year ago. We are loving reading it aloud! The book is laugh-aloud funny but also opens up much opportunity for conversations about racism.
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| Drinking tea and playing Connect Four while listening to me read |
5. Rocket Launch (Almost)
The kids were dedicated with school and music to be done by 1:00 on Wednesday so they could watch the three and a half hours of rocket launch goings-on before the 4:32 launch of two NASA astronauts on a Space X rocket.
Thomas conked out from all the excitement.
David kept waving and saying, "They are going to outer space!" (which impressed me at not yet three).
Unfortunately, with just fifteen minutes to go, the launch got scrubbed due to Tropical Storm Bertha, so we will try to watch the rescheduled launch on Saturday.
6. Graduation Parade
Because all the 2020 graduates lost out on grand ceremonies for their once-in-a-lifetime achievement, our neighborhood (like many) organized a parade for our neighborhood graduates (of both high-school and college). It was truly such a joy for us to participate as spectators!
The parade was led by a police car followed by a bagpiper and two or three school mascots (wearing fuzzy animal costumes in 72-degree heat and 91% humidity) who were throwing candy to the children, and the parade was concluded by a firetruck. The various graduates were each driven by his or her parents, many of the graduates sitting atop open sun roofs. The cars were decorated with balloons and signs. Folks blew noise makers and set off fireworks.
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| Running for candy |
7. Some Regular Routine
We are getting back to some regular routines: Hockey rec league has resumed, we've been to restaurants twice this week, Mass resumed last weekend and this week we also attended Confession one day and a combination Adoration-daily Mass another. However, summer plans are entirely up in the air, kids' camps and vacation might be scrapped, the children's swim lessons were just cancelled for the entire summer. My husband's international employer just announced that all in-person events are disallowed through February 2021 (nine months from now!) and the CEO and senior execs are all taking pay cuts.
I envision it will require great delicacy on all parts as we re-enter society with our colleagues, friends, and loved ones. Each family--and often the various members within a family--have been processing this coronavirus situation differently and may "be in different places," so to speak, intellectually and emotionally. Just this week, I was quietly noticing that one group of my friends has been alarmed from the start about the overreaching government, is not at all concerned about the vast majority of us catching coronavirus (due to its very low fatality rate), and wants to fully re-open our country in all aspects . . . and without masks! Another group of my friends were conversing and I discovered all of them are very concerned about the ongoing coronavirus situation: they talked of plans not to leave the house for the next year, about their intentions not to enroll their children in any face-to-face gatherings next fall for school, about the need to do everything possible online. Both groups of friends are women of the same religion, same political bent, and almost all homeschooling parents. I find this fascinating! I do not want any of us to damage friendships over these matters and I hope that all of us can proceed with grace.
Bonus Reading for Posterity:
- Coronavirus 'disappearing' so fast Oxford vaccine has 'only 50% chance of working'
- "Mortality due to coronavirus is a fake number. Most people are not dying from coronavirus. Those recording deaths simply change the label. If patients died from leukaemia, from metastatic cancer, from cardiovascular disease or from dementia, they put coronavirus. Also, the number of infected people is fake, because it depends on the number of tests. The more tests you do the more infected people you get. The only real number is the total number of deaths – all causes of death, not just coronavirus. If you look at those numbers, you will see that every winter we get what is called an excess death rate. That is, during the winter more people die compared to the average, due to regular, seasonal flu epidemics, which nobody cares about. If you look at the coronavirus wave on a graph, you will see that it looks like a spike. Coronavirus comes very fast, but it also goes away very fast. The influenza wave is shallow as it takes three months to pass, but coronavirus takes one month. If you count the number of people who die in terms of excess mortality – which is the area under the curve – you will see that during the coronavirus season, we have had an excess mortality which is about 15 per cent larger than the epidemic of regular flu in 2017." (‘Nothing can justify this destruction of people’s lives’)
- Apparently numerous serious epidemiologists said from the beginning that a lockdown was the wrong approach. (Who Believes the Lockdowns Were About Science? Genuine epidemiologists questioned the economic interruptions from the beginning.)
- Two-thirds of laid-off workers may temporarily be receiving more money in unemployment benefits than they did from their jobs
- I keep reading of plans for starting back to institutional schools in the fall and I cannot express my gratitude deeply enough for being an already-established homeschooler. (LAUSD 2020-21 School Reopening Plan: Child Prison)
- Lastly, now WHO is advising that only sick people wear masks: the same advice the CDC gave until a few weeks ago and the same industry practice we've practiced for decades. (WHO guidance: Healthy people should wear masks only when 'taking care of' coronavirus patients)
For more 7 Quick Takes Friday, check out This Ain't the Lyceum.
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