Mar
23
I’ve been working at home since 2010 and I can’t give you any great advice about trying to be productive with very small children underfoot since my main solution for that during the early years was to hire someone to come care for the kids while I escaped to a library or coffeeshop. Whenever I was on my own with them I pretty much constantly felt like I sucked at both work AND parenting and that wasn’t even with a global pandemic to worry about so my best tip there is to be kind to yourself and allow your children as many potentially unhealthy distractions as possible. This is not a time for heroic screen time limits or a reduction in carbohydrate-centric snacks.
I do have some general tips, though, if the hermit life is brand new to you:
Make your bed every morning. Even if you plan to crawl right back in it after lunch or whatever, I recommend doing so because it is a very small act that somehow holds a whole lot of entropy at bay.
Keep up with at least a minimal amount of personal maintenance. I am not suggesting that you spend half your day blow-drying and misting setting spray over a full face of makeup, I’m just saying that whatever your usual face-the-public routine is, do at least part of that. Not only will this be useful if you get a last-second Zoom invite, but I find that it helps me feel more pulled together and capable. The more you look like someone who hasn’t left the house in days, the more you will feel like that person, and what you want to avoid here is to begin carrying around a volleyball named Wilson.
Get dressed. Cozy clothes are obviously where it’s at right now but I can tell you from personal experience that spending the entire day in my sloppiest sweatpants makes me feel icky. Your mileage may vary in this department, maybe a Snuggie makes you feel comforted and happy and if so you should rock that look 24/7 until the world returns to some semblance of normal (or we all devolve and begin wearing harvested pelts), otherwise find some outfits that aren’t constrictive or unnecessarily fussy but still help you feel — well, I was going to say like your best self but ha ha ha ha, no. Like your most okayest self.
Take screen breaks. I know this advice applies to being in the office as well but I think it’s particularly important at home, where things can just feel really weird when you’ve been head-down on your laptop for actual hours while sitting on the couch or whatever. Set alarms if you have to, just get up and do something different: start a load of laundry, walk around the block, stare morosely out the window and remember when going to the grocery store didn’t feel like an extreme sport, etc.
Fix yourself a real lunch. Now that we’re all trying to make our food last as long as possible I realize our individual menu possibilities may be limited, I’m just saying that if your lunch routinely becomes seventeen handfuls of Triscuits mindlessly consumed while scrolling the news you’re going to get bummed out and your keyboard will become absolutely fucking disgusting, don’t ask me how I know this.
Stay connected. This has always been a challenge for me personally but we’re mostly all in some form of isolation now. Text someone. Click that heart button like crazy. Tell someone you miss them or you’re thinking of them. Write a silly post about being stuck at home and throw that blog-bottle out to sea, because maybe it’ll be a tiny bit useful or at least bring a smile to someone’s face. Tell people what they mean to you. (You, dear reader, mean a whole lot to me.)
Mar
22
Spring weather in Oregon can be a real mixed bag but it has been glorious recently, like every day since our house went into shutdown has been fantastically sunny and warm and I am so deeply grateful for that. I have been on what seems like about a million walks and everything is blooming and it’s been enormously cheering, the only thing that would make it better is if my state would go ahead and let its citizens buy the real Sudafed again because as long as everything has been turned on its head can we at least enjoy the drippy-nose-stopping effects of legally acquired pseudoephedrine?
Okay, I guess that’s not the only thing that could make it better, I can think of one or two other improvements as well, such as my friend’s restaurant business not having to lay off half their employees last week, but I’m just saying: seasonal allergies are salt in the wound right now, Sudafed prohibitors.
We drove to the cabin yesterday, figuring that would be okay as long as we didn’t stop on the way there or back, or do our usual visit to the little nearby store for snacks, and that ended up being a much-needed break from news and worry. The boys went out target shooting, and I spent my time sitting out by the river. There are buds and flowers everywhere, and a mother goose who has made a nest on the riverbank and sits there, waiting. She watched me carefully as I briefly approached to take a picture, and I tried very hard to send her some sort of mental message: I come in peace, fellow mama.
I’m very glad to report that little story did not end with a righteous goose attack because I probably would have deserved it (wings beating me around the head, hissing beak in my face: HOW’S THIS FOR THE ‘GRAM, STUPID CONTAGIOUS HUMAN?), but there was something so bolstering about seeing her there. Life goes on.
The flow of the river felt medicinal too, as did the ongoing hum of traffic. If there is one downside to the otherwise idyllic cabin setting, it’s that the property is right on a fairly active highway that connects I-5 and the coast. Oregonians have been heading to coastal towns in droves lately (I can’t point fingers since we also did not stay home yesterday, but the photos of crowded beaches sure don’t seem very socially distant), so there were quite a few cars adding to the calm peace of river noises and birds.
Instead of wishing as I often have that the rumble of a logging truck was not competing with the call of a hunting osprey, I found the traffic sounds pleasant in their own way. None of us knows what tomorrow will bring, but for the time being, life goes on.
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