by Judy Handley | Mar 17, 2020 | 2020 Life Logs |
2020 Life Logs, Day 77: Happy St. Patrick’s Day
Date: Tuesday, March 17, 2020
Weather: Overcast and Rainy; High 44 degrees, Low 35 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Cottage, East Falmouth, MA
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Happy St. Patrick’s Day! It was a dreary, rainy day here on the Cape but still I encountered some moments of sunshine. One was when I went to water plants for friends who are out of town. What beautiful orchids they have, especially the bright yellow and red blossoms that look like bursts of sunshine. In the late afternoon I got a phone call from my friend Lynne who is in New Zealand . . . another bit of sunshine. And this evening when I took Shadow out for a walk, I saw that the daffodils just beside my front steps blossomed sometime during the day. The yellow blossoms were laden with droplets of water making their heads hang a little low, but they still conveyed rays of sunshine. Then while I was writing this, I got an email from my daughter-in-law Jo in Puerto Rico with a photo attached of Ziggy and Coco snuggling at bedtime. Another bright ray of sunshine. So, no big St. Patty’s Day celebration here today and no pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, but lots of moments of gratitude for those things that bring sunshine into my life even when the skies are gray.
by Judy Handley | Mar 16, 2020 | 2020 Life Logs |
2020 Life Logs, Day 76: Hunker Down
Date: Monday, March 16, 2020
Weather: Sunny and Colder; High 38 degrees, Low 31 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Cottage, East Falmouth, MA
While our federal and state governments are struggling with how to deal with the rise of the coronavirus, I know that each of you, like myself, are trying to figure out just how best to ‘hunker down’ and ride this out. Those of us that are retired are at higher risk, but it is much easier for us to just stay at home. Still, it is a challenge. But for working people with children, it is much more complicated. In talking with Heather this evening, she reported that indeed trying to work from home with three children who think they are on a snow day vacation is challenging. I got the ‘snow day’ mentality from watching the Rachel Maddow Show tonight. She was acknowledging that this is way children are thinking and the Goldpebbles bear that out. I really feel like the schools here need to step up. In talking with Justin this morning, he reported that the Ziggy and Coco’s teachers were in Google Classroom training today and starting tomorrow their students will have three hours of online school each morning that will use Zoom for face to face contact and Google Classroom for making assignments. Heather and Jed have heard of nothing like that happening here. Sam is supposed to keep checking Google Classroom throughout the day as different teachers are posting assignments at different times. Hopefully that will get more organized and hopefully there will be something more for Jonah and Ollie as well. At first it was no school for two weeks, but then yesterday the Governor of Massachusetts made that three weeks for all schools. But each hour it looks like it could be a much longer time. Learning to do school from home looks like what is going to have to happen and we need to figure out how to make that transition quickly.
It finally hit me today that my refrigerator is not ready for this, so I made a trip to the grocery store for some basics. Many shelves were empty and there weren’t even any carrots! Tomorrow I am going to try and place an order for veggies through Misfits. This is a company that delivers organic veggies to your door each week. Heather uses the service, so I am familiar with it. If it is not too late, I’m going to give it a try. It is called Misfits because the vegetables are not good looking enough to be sent to supermarkets. Subscribers get a decent rate for buying perfectly fine, but not so beautiful fruits and vegetables. I’ll let you know how that works out.
by Judy Handley | Mar 15, 2020 | 2020 Life Logs |
2020 Life Logs, Day 75: The Ides of March
Date: Sunday, March 15, 2020
Weather: Blue Skies, Sunshine, and Cooler; High 44 degrees, Low 28 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Cottage, East Falmouth, MA
William Shakespeare wrote twice in his play “Julius Caesar” the words “Beware the ides of March.” Forewarned or not, Julius Caesar was assassinated on March 15, 44 B.C. and once Shakespeare penned those words it gave this date the negative connotation. In 1493, Christopher Columbus returned to Spain after his first trip to the New World on this date and in 1941 a blizzard killed more than 140 people in Minnesota and North Dakota. There are long lists of things like this that happened on this date, but none have stuck with us like the assassination of Caesar. But a modern day Ides of March became a reality for me today when my friend Karen Baranowski knocked on my door but backed down the steps when I opened the door. We talked using ‘proper’ social distancing to carry on our conversation outside. Certainly not a normal situation, but one that is necessary in these times. As of tonight, the CDC has issued a statement saying that in-person events of 50 people or more be should be cancelled for the next eight weeks all across the country. This doesn’t apply to schools or businesses, but it is a major change in guidance. I talked to Heather this evening and got an update on how she and Jed hope to move forward this week with home schooling while working at home. I didn’t make a lot of progress on anything today. I think, probably like many of you, I spent a lot of time just thinking about how to organize my life for the next few weeks of the unknown. One day at a time.
by Judy Handley | Mar 14, 2020 | 2020 Life Logs |
2020 Life Logs, Day 74: A Virus Changing the Way We Think
Date: Saturday, March 14, 2020
Weather: Sunny and Windy; High 51 degrees, Low 34 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Cottage, East Falmouth, MA
This evening I was talking to Heather on the phone about our new lives living with the threat of the coronavirus. We are having to change the way we live very quickly, but on the phone call, I realized that I also have to change the way I think. There is no set roadmap to follow. Each of us has to make decisions about what we will and will not do to protect ourselves and to protect others in the next couple of weeks. And this requires that we change the way we think. I thought I had things under control and then I said to Heather that I would be going to play Mah Jongg on Wednesday evening. She quickly replied that I needed to rethink that decision. Basically she was saying that if we are going to be successful in flattening the rise in COVID-19 cases, we all need to stay home for the next couple of weeks—no indoor social gatherings no matter how small. Somehow I thought getting together with just four other people would be fine. Not so. Living with the threat of this virus demands that we change what we do AND we change how we think. This is a huge challenge and one that I have not faced in my lifetime.
Justin called this afternoon and I was hoping to hear that Puerto Rico was being spared. But that is not the case. The virus arrived in San Juan on a cruise ship and it is spreading across the island. As it was here, the announcement that public schools will be closed for the next two weeks was made yesterday. Justin and Jo have not heard from the private school the kids attend, but they are thinking that they will keep them home even if school is not called off. Jo thinks she might have been exposed to family members of someone with the virus at the supermarket yesterday. For the sake of others, they feel it is prudent to self-quarantine themselves for two weeks so as not to spread the virus in case she was exposed. The real change of thinking here is that we have change our own actions, not just to protect ourselves, but to protect others.
I continued my writing project today but got caught up fixing issues with the way one year of my logs were saved. I had to make changes in the names of one whole year of logs, day by day. Getting that tedious job done today should allow me to spend time writing tomorrow. I am bouncing back and forth between writing about the Voyage of Windbird and writing about growing up in West Virginia in the 1950’s. This has required that I call my sister a few times to do some fact checking. She has been told by her daughters that she is not to leave the house for now due to her age and underlying medical conditions. She is feeling the effects of being housebound and seems to enjoy the phone calls. And I enjoy getting her perspective on my memories. Shadow is enjoying the extra walks each day and not being left alone as I run here and there. So there is an upside to this new stay-at-home lifestyle.
by Judy Handley | Mar 13, 2020 | 2020 Life Logs |
2020 Life Logs, Day 73: A New Normal
Date: Friday, March 13, 2020
Weather: Overcast and Rainy; High 54 degrees, Low 38 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Cottage, East Falmouth, MA
Friday the 13th ushered in a new normal here in Falmouth. Basically for now, we are all home-bound or when we are out and about, we must be very mindful of social distancing. This is hard for adults, but almost impossible for kids. Hopefully, this new normal will be short-lived, but that is yet to be determined. The decision to close public schools in Falmouth was made today. Starting on Monday the Goldpebbles will be home schooled while Heather and Jed are trying to work at home at the same time. They are going to have to do a lot of juggling over the next couple of weeks. This is certainly not a normal situation and hopefully parents all over the country that are living through this will find ways to keep their sanity! The public library is closed for the next two weeks along with the community center and senior center. There will be no after-school activities until it is determined that it is once again safe. We are all going to have to be creative in figuring out how to spend our time in the absence of organized social activities. Biking and hiking sound like good outdoor activities and there should be lots of time for reading and writing while indoors. Most of us have never experienced anything like this in our lifetimes, so this is going to be most interesting.
by Judy Handley | Mar 12, 2020 | 2020 Life Logs |
2020 Life Logs, Day 72: Cancellations, Cancellations
Date: Thursday, March 12, 2020
Weather: Partly Sunny; High 48 degrees, Low 39 degrees F
Location: At Home in The Cottage, East Falmouth, MA
This was a big day of cancellations due to the threat of the coronavirus, but the Shamrock Luncheon sponsored by Encore and Newcomers did go forward. I made the decision to attend, but there were many empty places from others who cancelled at the last minute. The luncheon was at Liam Maguire’s Irish Pub on Main Street. I love that Falmouth has a family owned and operated Irish pub and that Liam provides the entertainment. This early gathering to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day will probably be my last pubic event for a while. As we are all aware, today was a day of many cancellations . . . public schools, colleges, basketball, baseball, Broadway theaters, even Disneyland. Those cancellations plus the stock market dive are a little scary. We are all moving into untested territory . . . and I didn’t mean that as a pun on the lack of coronavirus tests. It is just that we as Americans have no idea what the next days will look like. Things seem to change minute by minute. My Memoir Writing class was cancelled this afternoon as the instructor just got off an airplane three days ago and has cold-like symptoms. He thinks it is just his asthma acting up but didn’t want to take the chance of exposing others if it should be cold, flu, or virus related. That cancellation gave me the opportunity to attend a Technology class from home via Zoom. What a great way to get together with others online.
Heather called this evening to tell me that she and Jed will be working from home for the time being. Both Woods Hole Oceanographic and the Woods Hole Research Center have asked people to work at home for the time being. Public schools are still in session here for now. I did a little more food shopping this afternoon and am preparing for the possibility of a couple of weeks at home . . . just in case.
