Silver Linings
Well suffice it to say, spring isn’t going quite the way we planned…
As I’m typing, the world is literally shut down, with fear and panic being the overruling emotions. You pretty much can’t go anywhere or talk to anyone, and so far there’s no real end in sight. And what’s with all the toilet paper hoarders? Honestly, with all that’s going on, it’s super easy to focus on the negative. But you know what? In my house, there’s been a whole lot of positives too.
Don’t start rolling your eyes yet!
I’m not about to sit here and lie to you, talking about how my family is just loving the time all crammed together, and how I’m managing to write the next great American novel and simultaneously cook all the gourmet meals I’ve always wanted to try, while my well-behaved children and attentive husband look like Pottery Barn models in the background of my pictures, with the hashtag #lovingthisquaratinelife!
Nope. Not in this house.
We, like I’m sure many of you, are surviving. Nothing is great, but thankfully nothing is horrible either. And I will say that there have been some unexpected great things to come out of us being stuck together day after day, and I decided to write them all out in one place so that come June, when I’m ready to hop on the next hot air balloon to Antarctica (because y’all know I won’t be getting on an airplane), I can look back on this blog post and remember that there were some silver linings in this nutso playbook.
First off, I was already a homeschooling mama, so it wasn’t stressful to have the schools close; however, we sure were used to having afternoons free to roam about.
Life was full of errands, Girl Scouts, soccer practice, piano, playgrounds, all that type of normal stuff that you don’t really think is great until you can’t do it anymore!
Now, come early afternoon we get done with school and just look at each other like, “now what?”
So… I started to add in cool stuff that I never would have taken the time to do before. Art class with Mo Willems? Absolutely, we need to know how to draw the Pigeon!
Watching the zookeepers play with wild animals? Sign us up for the bearcat talk!
Virtual Disney rides? Get me on that Millenium Falcon!
There is literally zero reason for me to not take advantage of all of the amazing talent on the internet right now, and it serves a great purpose—if done right, these internet experiences can enrich my homeschool program in ways I wouldn’t have thought.
A close second is that my hubs is home more.
Like most of you I usually only get to see him as he’s getting out of bed at the crack of dawn to head in to work, then in the evening as he rolls in for dinner. Now, since even the higher education schools have all closed, he’s set up his workspace in our dining room, with his fancy headphones that drown out all background noise (how the heck do I get a pair of those?), and we get to see his face all day long. Plus, he has no choice but to be home on time for dinner because he’ll have three kids hanging off his legs telling him to come to the table, which is literally five feet away.
Win!
Yes, the snacks are getting eaten at an alarming rate.
Yes, my toilet paper is dwindling faster than I thought possible (it’s just one more butt, what the heck?!). But he’s home, which is better than the alternative. I have close friends whose husbands got stuck on deployment, got called up from the National Guard, or are in a medical profession and staying separate from their families to keep them safe. They don’t get their husbands home, so I’m definitely calling this one a silver lining.
Next, I’ve taken back up the art of walking for fun. Last summer my oldest daughter and I did a 55-mile hike over the course of five days (that’s for another blog post), and to get our legs ready, for months we would strap on our hiking packs fully loaded and go for longer and longer hikes. After the big hike was over I just…stopped doing it. I blamed it on the next homeschool year being tougher, which it was, but it really came down to me not wanting to take the time for long walks anymore.
Well, guess what? All we’ve got now is time.
Lots and lots of time.
Once or twice a week since quarantine has started, I’ve persuaded the whole family to get on our good hiking shoes, fill up some water bottles, grab some snacks, and get the heck outside. We’ve done everything from wooded trails to rocky chasms, beautiful neighborhoods to the Teddy Bear houses. It has felt wonderful to be outside in the fresh air, all together as a family, talking about all sorts of random things.
I’ve also found the time to take up a few hobbies that I never thought I would enjoy.
I’m a voracious reader, and if you were to ask what my best day would look like, it would be to sit curled up with a good book and a refilling cup of tea, all day. Well, guess what? After almost five weeks in quarantine (it will be almost eights weeks by the time this blog is up) I’m actually tired of just reading (I can’t believe I just typed that.. Waiting to get hit by lightning…).
So, when my daughters asked if we could sit and color together one day, I happily agreed. Turns out, I love it! Got myself an adult coloring book and a fancy pack of colored pencils, and every night I sit and color for a little while after the kids go to bed.
Another crazy hobby? Puzzles. A gal on our local buy/sell/trade page had some puzzles she was looking to swap, and I thought, what the heck, why not?! We swapped puzzles, and the kids and I have had a great time struggling over where to fit all the teeny pieces. Never in a million years did I ever think I would be coloring and puzzling like a sweet little old woman, but here I am. It’s actually been a great way to quiet my mind, and focus on the next piece to find, or the next color to grab. I swear, if this quarantine lasts any longer I’m going to take up knitting.
And lastly, after all this quarantine time, I’ve learned to just chill out and embrace the mess.
Listen, I like my home neat. I assume that at any moment a camera crew is going to knock on my front door and need to come in to award me the Publisher’s Clearing House prize money, and I’m not going to be that woman caught on camera with her house looking a hot mess. Not the whole house, mind you—just the entryway, living room, dining room, and kitchen.
That’s not so bad, right?
Well, that went right out the window at about Week 2 of all of us being stuck at home. At present, all of my childrens’ Lego sets are spread across my formal dining room table in various stages of being built, to include the large programmable robot. Matter of fact, Batman and the Disney princesses have been having parties, going against all social distancing rules… gonna have to talk to them…
My massive Nordictrack treadmill box is in the basement with windows and doors cut out to make a huge fort, complete with original artwork on the sides. And of course blankets and pillow and books and toys need to be actually in the fort, so no one gets bored while they’re down there playing.
Then there’s the multiple art sets and colorful construction paper on the living room tables for any impromptu internet classes, because who knows when the mood will strike and the next Van Gogh will be created? Who am I to stifle that? And I honestly don’t even want to talk about the kitchen. My family is using dishes I didn’t even know I owned. It is an absolute mystery to me how 10 spoons can be used in the course of a breakfast, but there it is.
So, my house is messy. And since I’m fairly certain that even the Publisher’s Clearing House guys are quarantined as well, I’m feeling pretty secure that I’ll have time to clean it up before they get here in August.
Yes, this virus situation sucks, there’s no getting around it. And I know it can be hard to see past the stress and anxiety this might be causing your family. But if you can, even once a day, try to find something positive that happened.
Write it down and post it on the fridge, and add to it as the days go by.
Sometimes the best stories, and the most growth, start with horrible events, and I’m hoping and praying that at the end of this, we can look back and see at least a few shiny silver linings.
