March was the beginning of the end to what my family knew as Normal.
Preface
Things were going really well for us when March began. The boys were making more friends at school and enjoying their after-school enrichment classes. I had just launched my music studio, which already had a waiting list, and was teaching a 7 week music enrichment class at the school. The variety show that the boys and I were involved in was one week away.
We were finally feeling like a part of the community instead of just newbies. Kids from school would see the boys at the grocery store and call them by name to say hello. Students and parents were coming up to me at local restaurants to say how much they love class and rehearsals with me.
Jeremy was making progress on some new projects and products with work and getting ready for his favorite food conference in LA.
There was not a lot of serious talk about Corona-virus. The first time I had heard of the sickness was during a conversation in Colorado in late January, just that a new sickness in China was killing thousands of people. Mid-February, I saw some pictures of Wuhan completely shutdown. It looked serious, but also felt very foreign and unbelievable. I told myself, “I guess that’s what happens when people get sick in a communist country.”
Then, our church announced some adjustments/closures to missions in Asia and said that international church leaders should not travel to SLC for the upcoming General Conference. That’s when my head started to turn and pay more attention. I read the CDC guidance and warnings about the virus, which basically said wash your hands and don’t cough on people. Seemed reasonable to me.
Jeremy sent an article to our siblings about preparing 2 weeks of food and supplies in case we get sick. That whole concept of quarantining yourself for a mild fever and cough seemed overboard to me. I think it seemed overboard to almost everyone.
Warnings about the need to cancel large events in the next 2-4 months were floating around (maybe by the CDC, I can’t remember). I registered the boys for Zoo Camp on Feb 28 and felt compelled to ask what would happen if they had to cancel the camp due to corona-virus. The customer service lady had not been asked this question yet, so I was on hold for about ten minutes. I thought it was sorta dumb for me to be asking. She said that if they had to cancel, we would get our money back. I told the lady thank you and apologized for asking since it seemed silly to think that camp would ever be canceled.
Little did we know.
The next two weeks unraveled very quickly. The quickest change took place March 12- 20. It felt like 15 foot waves were crashing on us constantly, with no time to catch our breath in between. It’s hard to remember exactly what happened when. In order to get the timeline correct, I went back through FB posts, picture data, calendars and text conversations. Just writing this blog post has triggered some “post” traumatic stress, pun intended.
Joking aside, this truly has been one of the most emotionally draining posts I’ve ever written. I did not anticipate that it would take me over two months to draft, revise and edit it.
Are you ready for the ride? Here we go…
Sunday, March 1
Jeremy and I sat the boys down for a hand washing lesson. We spent 20 minutes in the bathroom modeling how to dispense the liquid soap so that just a chocolate-chip size of soap gets poured onto our hand. We also reviewed how to spread the soap everywhere, lather and scrub for 20 seconds, rinse all of the bubbles off, and dry with a towel.
At the time, my focus wasn’t really about Corona-virus. I just wanted to teach my kids how to stop wasting all the soap. I didn’t have any clue that there soap would be out of stock at the stores two weeks later. I’m grateful I listened to the promptings to teach my kids to conserve.
Monday, March 2
While the boys were at school, I worked on making website pages for my summer music camps.
After school, we chilled on my bed and started playing “ground is lava”. I would have compltely forgotten about this experience if we didn’t have pictures of it.
The game evolved into a very elaborate adventure. We wore my scarves, which gave us different powers. An enemy creature (Jeremy) sliced my body and almost killed me. The boys took me on a journey through a volcano to get a special stone that would cure me. Tanner used the laptop to unlock made-up clues and traps and doors. We videoed some of it as we played because the boys were so adorable trying to save me. They succeeded just seconds before the volcano blew up!
Tuesday, March 3
Super Tuesday. Jeremy voted by mail because he wanted to see how it worked. I went to our precinct. This day feels like eons ago.
I’m pretty sure I voted for Warren, but I honestly don’t remember anymore. (It was a hard choice between her and Klobachar). They had a bunch of hand sanitizer and a few people wearing masks. I saw a news article about people in WA doing drive-up voting to prevent the spread of corona-virus. Seemed way overboard to me, even with the growing number of cases in the state. (Most of them were all at the same nursing home).
More graphs and charts were being shared on FB. The CDC was posting new information about the virus and recommending that large events like sports and conferences be postponed or canceled altogether.
I did some more work creating my summer music camps, trying to ignore the nagging feeling that they might not happen. Four weeks later, I realize this was the last time I thought about my music camps for awhile.
I made a funny post about all my scarves.
Also, the food conference in Anaheim that Jeremy was looking forward to, called Natural Food Expo West, decided to cancel their event. Jeremy was really bummed, but relieved of the dilemna on whether or not to still go.
During one of my piano lessons, I encouraged my student to wash her hands. The parent made a comment about corona-virus, and I couldn’t tell if it was a joke or not.
Weds, March 4
Stores were starting to have shortage of toilet paper. Everyone was so confused by this senseless hoarding. Jeremy joked about taking home some toilet paper from work. We had at least 2 weeks of TP, so I wasn’t concerned. (Once that 2 weeks ran out, we ended up not having TP for a week. It was fine though, cuz we had a ton of baby wipes).
We had dress rehearsals for Act 2 of the Variety Show. Tanner and the other children were all set for their individual acts! We also did cast pictures.
Thursday, March 5
We finished our last day of after-school enrichment classes. It was such a fun day!
Dallin took Lego Engineering and Circus Performing. He did some juggling in his informal performance that Jeremy was able to watch. Tanner took Lego Engineering and got a 2nd place trophy in his Chess Class! We were so proud of the boys for giving these classes a try. They both were really nervous and did not want to have anything to do with the classes when it first started. When the courses ended, they begged to do them again!
While the boys were in their classes, I taught Music Around the World to two different groups of kids, total of 25 students. It was a blast. The school doesn’t have a music program for K-4th grade, so it was really neat to bring a whole new experience to the children here. An added bonus was that teaching these classes allowed me to pay for both boys’ classes and for most of our upcoming trip to Mexico City.
I noticed teachers using hand sanitizer a bunch more than normal. The school district sent out notices encouraging parents to keep their children home if they have any kind of cough, sneeze, sniffles or fever, even if the symptoms are caused by known allergies.
Also, Jeremy and I got in a big fight about lemons. 😂😂 This was one of the pictures he texted me to help prove his point.
Friday March 6
Rumors were really flying around that Covid19 is going to kill millions of people in the united states. Death tolls in Italy were making headlines. My heart was sad for these people, and I tried to understand why the numbers were so high. I tried to fish through articles and got annoyed by all the skewed information that only talked about deaths.
Dallin stayed home from school. He had the sniffles and slept in. Also, I spent at least an hour on the phone trying to get some things straightened out with Tanner’s vaccine records because I was getting mixed messages from the doctor and the school about what was needed for booster shots.
I found Dallin reading a book. This had become a pretty common sight and still is. If he can’t hack into any of our screens, then Dallin finds a book. Sometimes, he even opens up books without looking for screens first! His reading skills and interest have really exploded this year. He especially likes reading out loud and being really expressive.
Also Friday March 6
I got our St Patrick’s Day decorations out. My painting from Grandma Robertson with some of her leprechaun stuff looked super cute. All I needed was a cushioned toilet seat for the bathroom to be all Grandma. Dallin moved the legs and hands of the dancing leprechaun so that it was doing the pee dance. 😆 The boys enjoyed some good ole Ninetendo time, too.
Jeremy went golfing with some coworkers and thought this view looked cool.
Saturday, March 7
I got emails about the district making a rule that any children showing signs of illness will be sent home. No longer just a suggestion.
We were able to enjoy the Science Expo at the Padres Stadium. We were relieved it was not canceled like the Food Expo. We saw cousin Shauna, who was volunteering at the Illumina booths with her work.
Matt and Johanna came down to join us in the adventures. The boys were a little hesitant about everything at first, and then got excited about watching different experiments. We learned about DNA, laws of motion, gravity, chemical and physical reactions, biodiversity and so much more! The kids got cool backpacks and other free items.
There were several hand sanitizer stations throughout the park, which at the time was very out of the ordinary. There were also signs about being aware of spreading illness. Other than that, things ran as any other fair did. No one was wearing masks or concerned about keeping social distance. I don’t even think I had heard the word “social distance” at this point.
We came home after the fair to rest and regroup. Dallin played Nintendo with Matt. Then we headed over to Children’s Pool beach to see the sunset. The boys had a blast climbing on the sandstone walls.
The sunset had an eerie beauty to it. As the sun poked through the clouds, there were bursts of color and it formed some amazing silhouettes. But then it got dark and ominous. The ocean was really dark, too. I got the sense that a storm was coming, but not a weather storm. I tried to snap myself out of the feeling by joking about it. I said “It feels like Mother Nature is telling us the world is coming to an end! Oooh!”
Did I have a premonition? Maybe. There are lots of instances where I felt like the future would be uncertain and bad things were going to happen. I find it peculiar that I made the joke on this particular day, because the following week is when everything really unraveled. Maybe I was trying to give myself some assurance that things weren’t as bad as everyone was saying it will be.
Perhaps I was making an effort to hear how ridiculous it sounds to say out loud, “the world is ending”. Yep, it truly did sound ridiculous.
But it also felt a bit true.
I’ve now learned that the absolutely ridiculous, shocking, and impossible things can and DO happen. I wish it really was just a joke.
After watching the sunset, we went to an awesome Chinese restaurant that serves Shanghai Dumplings. Yes, Chinese. Could things get more coincidental? It was on our list of places to take Johanna and Matt, and it just happened to be when Trump was calling corona-virus the Chinese virus. Coming here for me was a way to show that I do not support racist comments like that. I’m sad that many people are afraid of Chinese food now. Our meal was absolutely delicious!
Sunday, March 8
News reports of toilet paper going out of stock are all over my feed. Lots of my friends are sharing different articles about the virus. More discussions are being made. Everything I read and learn about the has me confused as to why people are freaking out so much.
We went to church and all was normal except that some older members were wearing masks. At this point, it was known that senior citizens were at greatest risk to get sick and have severe complications with the virus. Jeremy decided to give elbow bumps instead of hand shakes (I was bothered by this). The kids in primary were really quiet during singing time. Looking back, I wonder if they all were feeling the weight of COVID19 coming down. I was asked to meet with the stake president about something, but we got hung up with choir. We didn’t know, but this was the last day we attended church for at least the next 19 weeks.
Monday, March 9
We get more emails and messages from the school about keeping our kids home if they are sick.
The kids slept in and seemed under the weather. I was more than happy to let them sleep in and see if they’d be better by lunch. Honestly, I was feeling really burned out by the Variety Show and private lessons, so I was relieved that we didn’t need to rush to school.
By lunch time, the kids were feeling better, so I took them to school. Tanner worked on his TOD fort documents that morning. This is his manual that he made for each member, describing the club and the secret language.
At school, the nurse and principal did not let the boys into school because of the vaccine issues. I was pretty confused and frustrated about this because I thought we had solved the problems on Friday. There was a lot of miscommunication about what they actually needed (FYI-the boys were behind the state vaccine schedule because CA is different from MN). We went home and then took the boys to the doctor.
At the doctor, I had a bunch of questions. Let me be clear that I support vaccines. They save lives. But I also support individual adjustments to vaccine schedules and taking a close look at the necessity of each vaccine on an individual level. I wanted to make sure I was doing the best thing for my kids.
The doctor told me the boys have to get the shots or else they can’t go to school. She told me I have waited longer than was allowed and there are not other options to prolong the wait. I told her, “Well, except doing home-school. That is an option.” For a second, I had the feeling that this will actually happen. I had a little war with myself in that moment- do I seriously want to consider homeschooling them?
Then the doctor asked me, “Do your kids like their school?” And I described how much they love it and although I could do home-school, I would rather they attend public school. And I reminded myself about the Variety Show that was in a couple days, how they wouldn’t be able to participate without the vaccine or a medical exemption.
Long story short, Tanner got his booster for varicella. Dallin got his booster for MMR and a medical exemption for Varicella because I asked a million questions and figured out how to legally delay his varicella booster. (No thank you to the doctor for not giving this information forthright). I was really happy about this because I believe the longer time in between shots, the better, so that their body can build proper immunity and have less chance for reactions.
Well, you can imagine how pissed I was later in the week when their Variety Show was canceled and then school was canceled for the whole year. My whole point for them to get the shots was null and void. Grrrr.
After school that same day, we had our final dress rehearsal for the Variety Show. I did not realize there was a lot of hype in the room about Covid19 until during a quick break, parent helpers went around the auditorium frantically squirting hand sanitizer in the kids’ hands. It was very distracting to me as I tried to rehearse with the kids, and again, it felt wasteful and unnecessary.
Then, we were asked to make sure the kids don’t touch each other in their performing numbers. The show was TOMORROW. Over 3 of our huge group number acts involved hand holding. This was a big part of the show because the theme was “Give Peace a Chance.” We took great care to make sure the kids were actually holding hands and show peace and love to everyone. Now, all that work was thrown to the ditch! It was very stressful to make last minute adjustments with just a few minutes of rehearsals left.
Between the vaccine battle and this, I was overwhelmed. Anger about everything with COVID-19 had been born.
That night, I decided to take a break from cooking. We used a xmas gift card at the Indian restaurant in our neighborhood called Curry-osity. We got to sit in a fun area on the ground. I remember thinking, “This is good that we are sitting alone over here because no one will be worried about our kids being noisy… or if our kids will spread germs.” We thoroughly enjoyed ourselves even though we did not know that this would be the last dine-in restaurant experience we would have for the next 10 weeks.
Tuesday, March 10
The boys were able to go to school. It was also the first half of the performance for the Variety Show to all the students. Dallin danced in a group number and did a great job. I did not attend the performance because it was only for students and I did not have anything that I was in charge of for this act.
There was rain today. The power went out at some point before noon. I had to use the emergency handle on the garage door to open it so I could go pick the boys up from school. I took the boys swimming and the power was on when we came home. But the garage door did not hook back up correctly.
I found this in Dallin’s backpack. “When I am 100 years old, I will send my grandkids money so they can go to the store to buy candy and send it to me so I can eat it.”
Graphs and reports of Covid cases from around the world and in the USA were upfront in all my media feeds. Italy was a hot topic, and there were clips of entire cities being quarantined. I thought to myself, “I can’t imagine this happening to us, being required by the government to stay inside for two whole weeks!”
Rumors about professional sports leagues canceling their seasons were also spreading.
That evening, Tanner went to his church youth activity and brought a neighbor friend. They all had a blast. Three of the kids at our church knew our neighbor because they all go to school together. It was a great moment for Tanner to see how positive it can be to include friends in different parts of our life. The boys made plans for the next activity, which we hope will happen someday.
Wednesday, March 11
Tanner and Dallin had a half day due to Parent Teacher Conferences. Tanner performed his little pogo stick act in the Variety Show for the school audience. He did a super job!! I was able to be there to help him get on and off the stage. He was quite nervous, but afterward was really proud of himself!!! I don’t know why I didn’t take any pictures?! Maybe because I planned to get a ton of pictures the next day at the big performance at the high school. I’m so sad about this.
The rest of the day proved to be big for the history books:
In the afternoon, we heard that the governor mandated that any gatherings larger than 250 people be canceled or postponed.
The NBA announced they are canceling the rest of their season immediately. Jeremy and I were shocked. Everyone was shocked.
A few famous people report that they have the virus. Conversations on all my parent groups were blowing up, asking what this means for schools.
We also saw more reports about toilet paper going out of stock. Teachers were complaining about hand sanitizer running out and not being able to find any at the stores.
The church announced that large gatherings like youth conferences should be postponed. They also announced that large audiences will not be permitted for the upcoming general conference. All members are to watch from their homes via technology. This was really surprising. They didn’t even want to let members go to the church buildings in small groups to watch.
That evening, I get an email about the possibility that the Variety Show will be canceled.
Thursday, March 12
This is the day we use to count how long the shutdowns have lasted, because, well, just keep reading.
It was another half day at school. Teachers sent messages asking for donations for hand santizer.
People were on edge waiting to find out what will happen with the Variety Show. At about 2 pm, they announced it is canceled.
I actually felt very relieved. I really didn’t want to be around the paranoia with the virus like at our rehearsal. I was glad to not have to deal with it.
The boys had a lot of mixed emotions about it. Tanner was mad that he had prepared all this time and now couldn’t do it. I could commiserate. I was angry about all the time I had sacrificed to help produce the show, and now it wasn’t happening. The team said we could try to reschedule later in the year, but something inside me said there would not be an opportunity to do that.
Jeremy’s work announced that starting Monday, everyone will have to work from home to prevent spreading the virus. We had been anticipating this because of the news and recommendations from the CDC. We had mixed emotions about it, trying to process and keep up with everything falling apart before our eyes.
The boys played the piano that evening and we watched a couple posts on the school page about the Variety Show. We wondered if and when school would actually get canceled due to COVID-19.
The church announced that all public gatherings with church worldwide are to be suspended until further notice. Absolutely shocking. No Sunday service, no youth nights, no classes, nothing. This influenced over 16 million people. The announcement mentioned that members can receive the sacrament in their homes once a month by local priesthood brethren. This was changed a few days later to say in more general terms that the sacrament can only be distributed in certain areas. For us, this meant no sacrament for many members in our area (which ended up to be over 12 weeks).
Now things were officially feeling apocalyptic.
Friday, March 13
Friday the thirteenth. Truly a day of bad luck.
It was another half day due to parent teacher conferences and the end of the quarter. Tanner stayed home from school because he was sniffly.
I picked Dallin up from school and waved to his teacher. She said something to me like “Take care and good luck!” I told her “have a great weekend!” We exchanged looks that said “this has been a crazy week.” I felt like I should walk up and talk to her and to give her a hug goodbye, but I ignored it. It seemed odd to do that, since I never give her a hug just randomly like that. I ignored the prompting, and now I really regret it because it was the last time I saw her for the rest of the year and it was one of the last chances I had to give someone a hug for the next 130+ days.
The school district had announced at 10:30 am that school would be canceled until April 6. I didn’t get the message until after Dallin and I got home.
The church announced adjustments to temple work. Posts from friends and family were going up about people trying to get married in temples that hadn’t already closed their doors to groups of 30 or more for marriages.
That afternoon, I took the boys on a little walk. I think we went swimming, too, but everything was a blur during this time, so I’m not sure.
Saturday, March 14
Jeremy and I were excited about the prospect of having a couple weeks at home with the boys. We made a list of all the things we could do together: discover new beaches, eat at new restaurants, go to the zoo and a couple museums on our bucket list, epic bike rides, maybe even camping!
Well, later that day, we heard about things shutting down. Disneyland, Sea World, the baseball league. It was so bizarre.
We took the boys on separate play dates to have some good one-on-one time with our kids.
I took Tanner on a hike around the canyon. We found the river and threw rocks and talked about school being closed. We barely had a chance to really tell the kids what was going on, since we also really didn’t know what the heck was going on. Tanner was super confused and didn’t really digest the information. We had fun looking for rocks and going on a new path. He let me make his hair into silly pony tails.
Jeremy took Dallin golfing at a par 3 course and then out for burgers! Dallin was very diligent with hitting the ball over and over to get himself closer and closer to each hole. He held the score card throughout the course and kept score. We were so proud of our Dal Pal!
That evening, we watched a video message that the prophet posted on social media. He addressed the concerns with the Pandemic and asked everyone to fast that coming Sunday for those around the world being affected by Covid19. This is the first time I had ever seen a video message from a prophet responding to a current event. Requests for fasting like this are usually done in writing.
Sunday, March 15
Our first day of home church.
We had a short lesson with Jeremy blessing and passing the sacrament to the four of us. It’s the first time the boys have ever done sacrament outside of the church building. This first time was especially awkward. The boys struggled to take it seriously. Okay, who am I kidding. They STILL struggle to take it seriously.
That afternoon, we headed for the zoo. We had heard it was the last day it would be open for the next 3 weeks, which turned into 13.5 weeks.
We had a blast and saw parts of the zoo that Jeremy and I had never seen before. The orangutans were hilarious. The little guy played peekaboo with the boys and showed us his teeth and hands. Then he spit on the glass and licked it up. Jeremy made a joke about spreading Covid19 and we all had a good laugh. We saw all the monkey and gorillas and lemurs and more. It was really neat.
We sat to watch some monkeys while we ate a picnic lunch. The boys had fun scooting around and around on this bench, humming while chewing their food.
Later that night, we went to the store to get some eggs for baking. Jeremy waited in the parking lot with the boys while I went into Smart and Final to grab the eggs.
About a 4th of the people were wearing masks. It was busy and dirty, trash all over the floors. The shelves for toilet paper, napkins and paper towels were all empty. Signs said “we are out of stock” and “limit one box per customer.” The water bottles were also gone. The canned food section was nearly empty except things like canned beats and creamed corn. Sections of the fresh meat section was also empty, but I did see giant bags of pig parts that I’ve never heard of.
And, no eggs.
I headed back to the front of the store. There were some St Patrick day cookies on display. Perfect solution for no eggs to bake with. I grabbed a tray and went to the check out lines.
While waiting, I glanced over at the produce isle. To my surprise, everything was completely stocked and untouched. Huh? Heaps of fruits and vegetables sat as lovely as ever, no one shopping for them! I chuckled to myself. “So, when there is risk of getting sick, Americans hoard TP and canned products, and completely ignore the foods that will actually boost their immune systems. What a screwed up world we live in.”
As we know all to well, there have been many more opportunities since then for me to say how screwed up the world is.
Monday, March 16
Jeremy had his first day of working remotely. Dallin kept him company in the library.
The boys and I took things easy. We stayed in our pajamas, played outside, did yoga. Ate a nice meal for dinner. Things seemed easy enough!
Jeremy and Tanner went on a cool hike in the canyon and found a place that we now call Ivy Canyon.
Work for Jeremy had taken a complete 180. Instead of begging people to buy more Tuna, everyone was begging him for more tuna. Shoppers raided the tuna shelf all over the country, just like they did with toilet paper. Jeremy pulled all promotions and put things on back order. To help make productions at the factories more productive, he temporarily canceled a few varieties so that production lines could go faster to try meeting the enormous demand that had developed.
Problems and delays were also being caused by new COVID19 rules for shipping and transportation. Everyday for 2-3 weeks there were new challenges for the food industry. It was very bizarre and stressful. Jeremy worked hard with his team to meet every challenge. We are grateful that the company was able to succeed in such uncertain times.
Tuesday, March 17
St Patrick’s Day. I didn’t have a lot going for us on this day because our minds were racing with school, church, and work being canceled. We cuddled in bed. I also managed to get some leprauchauns to make a barricade in the hallway with my scarves as a silly surprise for the boys. And I kept up the tradition of hiding Lucky Charms somewhere in the house and putting green pee in the toilet.
Tanner was not impressed with my Leprechaun acts, and he hated the Lucky Charms cereal because it was the chocolate flavored kind. He asked if we could get the original flavor. I tried to explain to him that none of the stores I went to had the original. Everything with Covid19 had made normal products out of stock. His frustrations and anger around Covid19 started to build.
Somehow I was able to get the kids to do school work from the little books we used in PR. I almost forgot that they did 4-6 pages of work per day until mid-April.
I tried some online music lessons with my current students. I figured sure, we can do this for 3 weeks, no problem! Had I known we would be doing online for the next 10 weeks, I would have taken a break to gear up. I look at this picture and remember how much energy I had to make things work for a short little while.
Our garage door was still giving us trouble. Remember the power outage a week earlier? Now the gears on the track were jammed, and the door was bent in. It made a terrible banging sound every time we tried to open and close it. Jeremy put in a work order to our landlord.
Wednesday, March 18
Big earthquakes in Utah. What is happening??
We stayed inside most of the day and insisted the boys should not play with any neighbor kids. It didn’t feel right one bit.
Thursday, March 19
Jeremy sets up an office space outside on the balcony. It was hard to see his screen in the bright light, but he was willing to do it for a couple weeks.
I took the boys to the park. It was such a beautiful day. There were hardly any people out, very odd to see only one or two cars at each intersection and absolutely no cars at the park. It was great to have tons of parking spots!
It felt great to see other people there. It helped ground me and feel like the world hadn’t actually ended. About a week later, all parks and playgrounds were closed. Playgrounds are still closed to this day. The boys climbed and swung and played, just like they should. I smiled and watched. took pictures, and tried to calm my troubled heart.
We drove the long way home and were amazed to see no cars anywhere around Balboa Park, which is the central park of San Diego. This place is usually teaming with people, even on weekdays during the school year. All the museums and shops were closed and only a couple people here and there. Surreal.
Friday, March 20
Tanner participated in his first zoom call with his class. A parent organized it so that classmates could say hello to each other. Tanner kept quiet for most of the call. After it was over, he said he hated it. As we talked about it, I realized that having the call made the reality of the shutdowns more prevalent for the boys. It forced Tanner to recon with all the uncomfortable feelings he had about it. Dallin had the same reaction to his call.
And why shouldn’t they? For a kid in public school, it is completely abnormal to see your school friends and teachers on a screen. The only reason for something so absurd to take place is if there was major disruption in the world, which there was!
I posted an advertisement for online music lessons on my FB page for Zavoral Music Studios, and got a few new students as a result.
Jeremy started the boys on Minecraft. They had been begging all school year to have it. Quarantine seemed like a perfect time to allow it. In order to earn screen time for Minecraft, we made the boys do chores. It worked really well for those first 2-3 weeks. Then we didn’t have any more chores for them to do!
I love this picture of Dallin because it captures so much of what we were experiencing. His face seems to say, “I don’t know what the crap is going on…I’m becoming a zombie to the world.”
We were completely slammed with a world of change in such a short amount of time, and still barely wrapping our minds around the necessity of all of it. March 12- 20 held the biggest changes. That’s only a matter of 8 days!
EIGHT DAYS.
During the coming weeks, we began to realize that what we were experiencing was legitimate shock and trauma. And things were just getting started. As I write this four months after the fact- 130 days into shutdowns- it’s becoming more and more apparent that these 2.5 critical weeks in March really were the beginning of the end to life as we knew it.
