Week 5 of Shelter in Place, Monday, April 20, 2020
Thoughts and feelings at the start of Week 5:
- Will this ever end?
- What day is it anyway?
- Every day is the same.
- Will we ever be able to go to Onawa?
- Will this coronavirus come back in the fall?
- Will we be sheltered in place again next year?
It is hard to figure out what day it is when I no longer have Yoga on Tuesday and Thursday and Aquacisers on Monday and Friday and volunteer at Ruskin Elementary on Wednesday all at 9:00 AM. It seems that every day finds me at noon or 1:00 PM and I say where has this day gone? Part of it is that I don’t get out of bed until after 9:00 AM and then eat breakfast. Jon takes a walk and I usually try to do yoga in the morning but sometimes decide to do something on the computer first and all of a sudden, the morning is gone. There is one day, Sunday, that we do attend a church service online. It starts about 11:15 AM but you really can start it anytime, so it was noon when we started yesterday.
Then there is the afternoon, we fix lunch but that can be anywhere between 12:30 to 2:00 PM depending on when one of us decides we are hungry. We eat out on the screen room in the warmth of the day. So, between the warmth and a full belly a nap is calling our names! Jon stays right where he is, and I go inside. The next thing we know it is 3 – 4:30 PM and the afternoon has disappeared. Usually it is in the afternoon that I get texts or phone calls or make some of them myself. It is the only way that we are staying connected with friends. It is nice that we are able to do this with not only friends in SCC but also friends from all over the world.
Around 6:00 PM, as the day is starting to cool off a little, we head out for a walk around the golf course and then have dinner. If the weather is really hot, we eat and then walk between 7 and 8 before it gets dark. We have not eaten anywhere but home since March 13. Lucky for us we both do cook so we are able to take turns fixing our meals. Jon likes to find new recipes and I generally stick to my old favorites. During dinner we watch Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy and then I frequently watch my soap opera, General Hospital before Jon joins me watching whatever until the 11:00 news, followed by bed.
I am getting bored as most people are. At first, I was excited to have time to do some projects I have not had time for. The major one for me is scanning pictures into the computer and then putting them back into the albums for Rebecca and Jeff. I have done 1977 – 1981 and have the pictures laid out for 1982 and 1983. That is all I have here in FL so the project will be coming to an end soon. Then what? I have also started making an afghan for a friend who is doing wonderful things for our family. It is half done and I have been working on it a little over 2 weeks. It should be done before we get up north.
Speaking of up there, when will that be? Next week we were supposed to have Carter here with us and in July we were taking him to Switzerland and Italy for his twelve-year-old trip. Today we just cancelled that trip. Bummer! We did book it for next year so here is hoping we are not going through this again next year. We really need a vaccine! But that will take a while for all the testing and trials that are needed.
We normally leave for Melrose the first week of May. We just do not know when we will feel it is safe to travel. Rebecca is not sure she wants us in Melrose because she is worried that she or the kids might give us the coronavirus. She has said we should go straight to Onawa, but Maine does not want us. We have heard they are pulling “out of state” cars over at the toll booth and requiring them to commit to a two-week quarantine, giving them the address, you will be at with a phone number. We could of course do that and just take 2 weeks of food with us. Right now, they had snow last week and then there will be black flies so maybe now is not the time.
We will drive north in our new Kia Telluride and our new refrigerator that plugs into the car. It is our hope we will be able to have our own food with us. Right now, the restaurants are closed except for carry out and I guess we could do a little carry out, but we will plan to take enough food with us. We are thinking we do not want to stay in a motel so we are thinking we will drive straight through, 21 driving hours to Melrose. Lucky for us we both do sleep in the car when the other is driving and we also are successful sleeping on a plane so we figure we can pull over somewhere and sleep in the car for a few hours. One little hitch we have heard from someone driving to Michigan is that once they hit the Georgia border there were no more restrooms available. You can get gas, for which the price has gone down, but no public bathrooms. So, we will have to see how things are in the next month.
Yes, it is getting tiring to have the same routine every day, have no idea what day it is and not be able to be with our friends doing the activities we love which is why we are in Florida. I do realize that is exactly what most people are feeling right now so I am not alone. I am very blessed to be able to spend this time in isolation with Jon. We do have friends and relatives who do not have a spouse to share these long days with. I think of them often and reach out to them periodically.
People I am especially concerned about are the health workers, grocery store workers, police, fire and all the people who are providing us with the essential services. My concern for them is the risk they are taking every day for themselves and their families. I am grateful for them and keep them in my prayers.
After writing this we had a request from our daughter Rebecca to have a friend of hers stay at our house. We were happy to help in anyway we could. This friend is a nurse at Mass General Hospital who has been called to work on the Covid-19 unit. She has a family of two young children and a husband with questionable lung issues. She does not what to expose them to anything. She can stay at our house and still be able to go and wave at the family from a distance when she is not working. It is a small way we can help with this crisis.