At the start of the madness, I texted two teacher-mom-writer friends and asked if they would be willing to write about this experience together in my blogspace. Julie, one of my dearest teacher-mom friends, took me up on my offer today. Enjoy her eloquence and ability to capture what I know we are all going through in our little house-pods all over the country.

 

All of my tabs are open.  Every. Single. One.

The tab that tells me how to talk to my kids, how to keep them calm when the world as they know it – as we all know it – crumbles around them. “Go out for a bike ride,” we say.  But instead of warning about speeding cars or vicious dogs, we warn of 6 feet and cross to the other side and, “No, you can’t play with your best friends today.” Or tomorrow.

The tab that opens to order all the things, because stores are the new haunted houses now.  There is no longer a “just to pick a few things up,” no longer a casual browse for something new-healthy-beautiful-interesting-splurgeworthy.  I order a myriad things – necessities and things-to-keep-busy and seeds to plant in the Spring.

The tab that asks when Spring starts.  A week ago?  Really?  We must have missed it while the world imploded.  I hope it didn’t take our locked front door and “Just leave it on the porch!” sign personally.  I hope it comes back.

The tab, the darkest one, that descends into the worst case scenario. The long-terms and the missed opportunities and the ventilators and the people the same age as my parents and NO…x out of that one.

The tab that tries to maintain safety and consistency and some form of academia for my students.  My students for whom I know my colleagues and I are…were their only sense of security and normalcy.  Read this book and journal your feelings and see how nice I made my video background so you could enjoy our sessions? I am trying to be there for them without being there, trying to make it clear how desperately I miss them and their lame homework excuses and the exploded pens on their desks.

The tab that is fueled by wanderlust and wants to travel to all these places that are closed up and broken, but will someday open wide again. The flights are so cheap, the beaches and museums and restaurants seem so empty, so ready.  But to hit the purchase button would be to tempt fate, so I will not.  Not yet. Fate has been tempted enough these days.

The tab that lists the symptoms.  I am 86% sure at least 13 times a day that I have it.  A slight sniffle or clearing of the throat – once innocent harbingers of the allergy season to come – now carry a foreboding sense of this is it.  I know, I think, that right now it has been kept at bay.  However, there is the constant, crushing fear that it has somehow stormed our gates and penetrated the Lysol force field I lovingly spray into existence three times a day.

The tab that generates lists and charts and schedules because order seems to quell the storms inside me.  There are complementary colors, trendy fonts, and orderly time frames with specific blocks carved out for “creativity.” But sometimes the implementation of order makes things feel even more chaotic, and I suppose I will need to make a list to combat that paradox as well.

The tab that reveals my family, some across town and some thousands of miles away.  We virtually clink our wine glasses, pretending to be OK with the cancelled upcoming vacation, the pirate show and Easter brunch that were never meant to be.  We laugh as the baby shovels food in with his chubby little hands, and we all have the same, staggering thought: He has no idea what’s going on.  Wouldn’t that be nice?

Slowly, slowy, I x out of my tabs as the day draws to a close.  One by one they disappear.  Some, I linger on. Some, I eagerly send away. I know they’ll all be back tomorrow to taunt and comfort and terrify.  But I hold out hope that one day, maybe soon, these tabs will finally, mercifully, be closed for good and I will finally, mercifully, be able to breathe once again.