Hi there. How are you? I know that’s a loaded question right now. Are any of us truly okay at the moment? But I hope this post finds you and your family safe and well wherever you are.
As I sit here in my home office, having to check what day of the week it is because I’ve lost track again, I find myself contemplating how much has changed in such a short time. In any generation, including mine, there are moments that mark Befores and Afters. If you’re anywhere around my age (40), you’ll know the ones I’ll list. The first one, the big one, is September 11. But there are others. Columbine. As someone who is from Louisiana and whose family still lives there—Hurricane Katrina. There are also personal ones. Like I was attending graduate school at LSU during a time a serial killer was murdering young women, including LSU students.
These events tend to have one thing in common—our sense of safety and our sense of control are shaken. Before September 11, we traveled without much thought beyond hoping the plane was in working order. Before Columbine, we went to schools where there was no check-in procedure at the front desk, no locked doors during the day, no such thing as a lockdown drill. I graduated in 1997 so I remember what high school was like before. Before Katrina, we had the sense that though we couldn’t control hurricanes, we were prepared to handle them. Before the Baton Rouge serial killer (although I was always aware of the risk of being a woman out and about in the world), I had never felt so hyperaware of how vulnerable I was to a predator. Those things stay with you. They are still with me. They will always be with me.
And so it will be with this too.
We don’t know what the After is going to look like in this case. All I can hope for is that everyone follows the rules they are giving us about social distancing and that the After is soon. But I know that the world will be forever changed by this. I will be changed, too. Some of those changes will be negative, like the ones listed above—higher anxiety is almost always a result of these things. But I’m also looking at the things that I’m learning already that maybe I can take forward and turn into something positive. That’s what I want to focus on today.
So what am I learning?
I have wasted a lot of food in my life.
I have never grown up in a home or in a time where food was not readily available. I’ve been enormously lucky in that. But that has also made me capricious about food waste. If something goes past the expiration date before I can use it, I toss it without thought. Now, with grocery stores having trouble staying stocked and grocery trips holding risk of being around other people, I’m scrutinizing every food item and making sure I use up things before they can go bad. Or, if something is past expiration date but still looks/smells fine, I’m using it. Those black bananas make great banana bread. That stale bread can be toasted. I think this experience will forever make me appreciate the food I have.
Being busy with work is a blessing.
We all tend to complain about how busy we are all the time. However, as someone who has a spouse in the recreation/entertainment field, I realize what a blessing it is to have work to do. My husband wishes he could be working 50 hours a week at his job right now.
My generation (Gen X) and the ones following do not have a lot of basic skills that our parents and grandparents had.
I’m saying this as a blanket statement and I know that it’s not true for everyone. But in general, the younger generations are less prepared with the basics. I know how to cook from scratch and bake bread (in a bread machine, so don’t be too impressed) because I happen to have an interest in that and taught myself. However, I have no idea how to even sew a button on a shirt. I don’t know how to grow vegetables. I think going through this is going to make a lot of us look at what missing skills we can learn. (Kidlet is currently trying his hand at an herb garden.)
Taking care of our immunity isn’t just a tagline on a vitamin bottle.
I’m a person who takes vitamins because I’ve had a vitamin deficiency before that knocked me down. However, we hear A LOT about how to take care of ourselves these days—sleep enough, exercise, get sunlight, eat healthy foods, etc. And we think of it as almost…trendy— #selfcare and all that. But this pandemic is showing us that, no, it’s not trendy, it’s a legitimate defense strategy. Taking care of ourselves needs to be a top priority, not just something we do at New Year’s. I’m as guilty of this as anyone, so I’m taking note.
We don’t have it all figured out.
I think we all had a false sense of security before this, especially here in America. We’ve seen outbreaks in the world before, but they were always somewhere else—some other country, something that we’ll stop before it gets here. It seemed like we had things under control. We didn’t. We don’t. We’re not special. Outbreaks affect us all. We’re all human.
Joy in the simple things is real.
This is another hashtag item. There is a lot of talk about simplicity in the last few years. It’s a trendy topic. Hell, I talk a lot about and read a lot about it. But, before this, I don’t know if it really had sunk in what it means, what that feels like. Never before have I been so comforted by seeing a sunny day hit the new spring grass or the beauty of the sunset. I don’t remember being so soothed by the birds singing as I have these past two weeks. Those signs that the world is still there, that nature is still present, fill me up and calm me. Along with other simple things—playing a board game with my family, the smell of banana bread baking, the way the horses behind my house gallop when they’re first let out in the morning.
I have sucked at being grateful before this.
Boy, have I been a spoiled brat. Never before have I thought to be thankful for toilet paper, for the ability to run an errand, for a single damn avocado. I’ve taken nights out with friends, chatting over queso, for granted. I’ve taken the fact that my kid can get on a school bus every day and go somewhere to learn for granted. I’m trying to be cognizant of gratitude right now, and I will try to hold onto that once this time has passed. I think this one will definitely be a Before/After moment. I think I’ll now always be thankful for toilet paper. :p
Time can truly slow down.
Usually, we all feel rushed, like the days just fly by. Time doesn’t stop, that’s true. But what I’ve learned after being home for two weeks, time is relative in a lot of ways. Things feel SO SLOW right now. A week feels like a month. Our perception of time can be affected. Right now, that’s not good. We don’t want this time to drag on. However, it may be useful in the future to know that if we want to, we can slow things down sometimes, take a day off, do some simple things and stop rushing everywhere.
Reduce/Reuse/Recycle is not just earth-friendly, it’s legitimately helpful.
I go through bouts of being environmentally conscious. In other words, I always care about the environment, but I am not always doing all I can. However, being in this situation now, I realize that being environmentally conscious is not just helpful for the earth, it’s legitimately practical. Because of my previous bouts of conscious, I have cloth napkins and cloth handkerchiefs already. I have castile soap that can used in a hundred different ways. I have mason jars to store all the things instead of counting on plastic baggies. When so many things are sold out, these things have really come in handy.
We’re all in this together.
Most of the time, we’re all doing our own thing. But with this, we’re united with the world. We all have to play our part. If I socially distance but you don’t, that affects everyone. For the first time in a very long time, all of humanity has a common enemy we are fighting. We’re on the same team. Let’s defeat this thing.
That’s all I have for you today. I love you all and am sending good thoughts your way. *socially distanced ghost hug*
And if you’re out there on the front lines as a health care worker, a grocery store stocker, a delivery person, or any of the other vital jobs still going on, I’m sending you an extra special thank you. We owe you so much. Thank you. Truly.
—Roni