Well now
Well now -
Isolation, day 2.
I think my creative writing ability has gone done the tubes with the isolation but we do what we can.
It happened really slowly ultimately but also really quickly.
Italy was there for us to see.Spain. Korea. China.
Last week I was out and about - at school, at work, volunteering with my favourite seniors. These activities keep me kind of even-keeled in that not even-keeled kind of a way if you know what I mean.
Then it came down from on high and everything shut down but not everything we can still go to grocery stores and drug stores and parks and the beach and some people still have to go to work. All schools have moved online or simply closed.
Businesses are closing - a yoga studio in my neighbourhood (because in my neighbourhood people jog and do yoga) just announced it is shuttering for good because of this isolation of unknown duration.
I felt so badly for them.
I have friends//acquaintances who work in the service industry and their work has just ended no starting again in sight.
My work for the spring/summer is gone in a puff of smoke - the ESL industry like so many other industries is decimated and will be for some time to come.
I live alone in a building with 11 other suites - a small building and we pass each other by sometimes. There is also a fresh new baby - 2 days old! living below me on the other side and his two mothers are thrilled and I am glowy for them and they are keeping their six feet of distance and hunkering down to new motherhood and it gives me hope because this time, this time really sucks.
This time sucks for so many.
So I thought I'd start a new blog. I'm thinking there will be thousands of blogs (do people still blog anymore?) about being basically quarantined in the time of Corona. More official quarantining will be upon us no doubt like Italy, like Spain because more and more cases are walloping through the town very sadly taking some seniors in care homes in its wake. To be the family of those seniors I can' t imagine. To be family of seniors not yet affected I can't imagine. I am very very close to a senior with advanced dementia in a care home and every day I search the news to see if her home has been hit. Not yet not yet. We love to sing together, her and I. Well, I love to sing and then she starts if she knows the tune which she often does.because memory of songs doesn't fade for some scientific brain reason. This is one of my favourite things on earth to do and I can't wait until I can see her again - I'll probably have us sing an entire medley or something. You don't know what you've got till it's gone which is actually a song. We'll sing that. We'll sing so loudly the other residents will beg us to stop. That kind of a thing.
Onward.
I went to the beach today - was so lovely outside. Looked at the ducks. And every person I saw I was thinking do you have this virus. Socially distance! Socially distance! My friend came after awhile and gave me an apple and cheese and we fed the ducks and birds nuts and sat at opposite ends of the bench and I said how do we make it through this and she said she didn't know but she is calm and measured and has a husband and daughter at home.
We get through because we get through and others have lived through wars they say on Facebook as a way of telling people to chill the heck out.
I'm worried about the Mormon missionaries - they aren't being sent home but rather being told to isolate in place wherever in the world they are and to teach via Internet but couldn't they do that at home? This must be terrifying for them and their families. Say your a Mormon missionary and you're sent to Ecuador and you learn Spanish at the Mormon prep school and then you go and you're there and suddenly you are told to isolate in your apartment with your companion and those apartments are small and teach your Mormon beliefs online and don't go door to door knocking. I worry. There are Mormon missionaries here - fresh faced young men usually who lurk at subway stations and I can't imagine what they are doing now and how they are handling it - they are usually just 18 or 19 years old.
Anyway, blogs for me tend to be a lot of stream of consciousness stuff. My brain is old(ish) and wired and tired and anxious and isolated and who knows how this will go but I'll try to be fairly regular with this for my own sake. The important thing apparently is to have a schedule in your non-scheduled life.
By the way, you know it is serious when ESL international schools shut down or go online. The downtown one I sub at sometimes has done this - they waited too long of course - but now they are completely online and the (middle-aged, often luddite) instructors have been given six days to prepare online lessons. I am not needed and in fact they will be laying people off. The really disturbing thing is some students came in internationally on Monday, expecting to start at the school immediately. Oops, they have to self isolate for two weeks but at least they will have online school. My (dire) prediction is that most ESL schools will shut their doors at some point, maybe even close.
So I'm re-training to work with seniors at some point - a good decision I see now. My college closed just days ago - too late as it was dragging its feet - and I have a few classes left online, an essay to write, and a peer reviewed journal to summarize. The essay will be hard to focus on but it isn't due for a couple of weeks. I find my concentration level is shot more than usual. Don't know if that will come back. Some of my classmates are posting photos of things they are cooking in their isolation (often with their parents I think) and I'm like wow. I am not a good cook that is for sure and not something I enjoy.
I'm going to try to keep this blog kinda light, kinda weird with probably episodes of dark despair as one would expect.
I am a writer of sorts but haven't written in almost a year because school, work, but also lack of motivation. I do fear my mental health sliding down the dark isolation hole but we shall see and if I write in this blog every day, then you shall see! You being my dedicated blog audience of . . .two. I'll say two.
Tell me anything about yourself in the comments if you like.
The next entry will be more focussed. Maybe I'll write about wind or lava lamps.
Or being middle aged and on my own during a time of pandemic.
Something like that.
Isolation, day 2.
I think my creative writing ability has gone done the tubes with the isolation but we do what we can.
It happened really slowly ultimately but also really quickly.
Italy was there for us to see.Spain. Korea. China.
Last week I was out and about - at school, at work, volunteering with my favourite seniors. These activities keep me kind of even-keeled in that not even-keeled kind of a way if you know what I mean.
Then it came down from on high and everything shut down but not everything we can still go to grocery stores and drug stores and parks and the beach and some people still have to go to work. All schools have moved online or simply closed.
Businesses are closing - a yoga studio in my neighbourhood (because in my neighbourhood people jog and do yoga) just announced it is shuttering for good because of this isolation of unknown duration.
I felt so badly for them.
I have friends//acquaintances who work in the service industry and their work has just ended no starting again in sight.
My work for the spring/summer is gone in a puff of smoke - the ESL industry like so many other industries is decimated and will be for some time to come.
I live alone in a building with 11 other suites - a small building and we pass each other by sometimes. There is also a fresh new baby - 2 days old! living below me on the other side and his two mothers are thrilled and I am glowy for them and they are keeping their six feet of distance and hunkering down to new motherhood and it gives me hope because this time, this time really sucks.
This time sucks for so many.
So I thought I'd start a new blog. I'm thinking there will be thousands of blogs (do people still blog anymore?) about being basically quarantined in the time of Corona. More official quarantining will be upon us no doubt like Italy, like Spain because more and more cases are walloping through the town very sadly taking some seniors in care homes in its wake. To be the family of those seniors I can' t imagine. To be family of seniors not yet affected I can't imagine. I am very very close to a senior with advanced dementia in a care home and every day I search the news to see if her home has been hit. Not yet not yet. We love to sing together, her and I. Well, I love to sing and then she starts if she knows the tune which she often does.because memory of songs doesn't fade for some scientific brain reason. This is one of my favourite things on earth to do and I can't wait until I can see her again - I'll probably have us sing an entire medley or something. You don't know what you've got till it's gone which is actually a song. We'll sing that. We'll sing so loudly the other residents will beg us to stop. That kind of a thing.
Onward.
I went to the beach today - was so lovely outside. Looked at the ducks. And every person I saw I was thinking do you have this virus. Socially distance! Socially distance! My friend came after awhile and gave me an apple and cheese and we fed the ducks and birds nuts and sat at opposite ends of the bench and I said how do we make it through this and she said she didn't know but she is calm and measured and has a husband and daughter at home.
We get through because we get through and others have lived through wars they say on Facebook as a way of telling people to chill the heck out.
I'm worried about the Mormon missionaries - they aren't being sent home but rather being told to isolate in place wherever in the world they are and to teach via Internet but couldn't they do that at home? This must be terrifying for them and their families. Say your a Mormon missionary and you're sent to Ecuador and you learn Spanish at the Mormon prep school and then you go and you're there and suddenly you are told to isolate in your apartment with your companion and those apartments are small and teach your Mormon beliefs online and don't go door to door knocking. I worry. There are Mormon missionaries here - fresh faced young men usually who lurk at subway stations and I can't imagine what they are doing now and how they are handling it - they are usually just 18 or 19 years old.
Anyway, blogs for me tend to be a lot of stream of consciousness stuff. My brain is old(ish) and wired and tired and anxious and isolated and who knows how this will go but I'll try to be fairly regular with this for my own sake. The important thing apparently is to have a schedule in your non-scheduled life.
By the way, you know it is serious when ESL international schools shut down or go online. The downtown one I sub at sometimes has done this - they waited too long of course - but now they are completely online and the (middle-aged, often luddite) instructors have been given six days to prepare online lessons. I am not needed and in fact they will be laying people off. The really disturbing thing is some students came in internationally on Monday, expecting to start at the school immediately. Oops, they have to self isolate for two weeks but at least they will have online school. My (dire) prediction is that most ESL schools will shut their doors at some point, maybe even close.
So I'm re-training to work with seniors at some point - a good decision I see now. My college closed just days ago - too late as it was dragging its feet - and I have a few classes left online, an essay to write, and a peer reviewed journal to summarize. The essay will be hard to focus on but it isn't due for a couple of weeks. I find my concentration level is shot more than usual. Don't know if that will come back. Some of my classmates are posting photos of things they are cooking in their isolation (often with their parents I think) and I'm like wow. I am not a good cook that is for sure and not something I enjoy.
I'm going to try to keep this blog kinda light, kinda weird with probably episodes of dark despair as one would expect.
I am a writer of sorts but haven't written in almost a year because school, work, but also lack of motivation. I do fear my mental health sliding down the dark isolation hole but we shall see and if I write in this blog every day, then you shall see! You being my dedicated blog audience of . . .two. I'll say two.
Tell me anything about yourself in the comments if you like.
The next entry will be more focussed. Maybe I'll write about wind or lava lamps.
Or being middle aged and on my own during a time of pandemic.
Something like that.
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