Essential

How do we decide what is essential? I mean, do we go back to basics and say that food, water and shelter are the only truly essential things? I’ve been working since late May. My job would not be deemed essential if you were to use the above criteria. I do not provide anyone with food, water or shelter. Okay. So in the case of a pandemic, we need to add medical care to the list of essential items. That means that anyone who provides people with food, water, shelter and medical care is essential. I’m still not essential and yet…here I am. I cannot do my job from home. Please know that if I could, and if my place of employment would allow it, I would absolutely be at home trying to parent my daughters, wife my husband and work for my employer. Alas, that is not an option for me. The girls are scheduled to go back to school on August 19. This makes teachers essential, right? Absolutely. And the support staff that keeps a school running must be essential too. With school starting, so are sports, which…are they essential? I mean, the kids probably thing so, right? We want so badly for life to get back to normal. We want to live and thrive and do things and be with people and yet…doing this might mean that some of us won’t live through this. Sigh. Recently (and here’s where all this pontificating is going, finally) Alyssa’s voice coach messaged us. She has openings for the fall and would love to add Lyss back to her schedule. Alyssa stopped voice lessons back in March when the world skidded to a halt. Her coach, Ms. C messaged us in June (?) and offered Alyssa a spot for summer lessons. We declined, deciding that at that time, voice lessons were not essential. But now? Still probably not essential but maybe, well, necessary? Or if not necessary, perhaps a bonus? Alyssa has worked so hard all summer. She’s masked up and served up beef and cheddars with sides of cheese sticks and jamocha shakes with very few complaints. So…voice lessons? Skip them for fear of contracting a potentially deadly virus? Go for it because damn it, how much more are we all going to have to give up? I know, logically, that limiting the number of people we have contact with is smart. I also know that each person one of us (my nuclear family being the ‘us’ in this instance) has contact with is bringing with them all the people they’ve had contact with and so on into infinity. But…my heart argues with my head and says, “When does it end?” My head wants to know who has to die for us to really stop all this whining. My heart whines that the voice coach gave lessons all summer long and apparently all is well. (Can you tell that Tom is my head and Alyssa is my heart?) What do we do? How far is too far when it comes to slowing down? How much is too much to give up? But really, when it comes to people’s lives, their actual hearts beating, is anything too much to give up if it means everyone gets to, you know, live?

Permission

Alyssa and I went to a graduation party last week.

Oh, calm down. We weren’t there more than ten minutes, we wore masks the entire time and we didn’t eat or touch anything. Sure, no one else in the entire room (it was the gym of an old school) wore masks and everyone else was acting like there is not pandemic but we were most excellent social distancers.

Also, we dropped Liv off at my mom’s along the way to keep our own numbers down and let’s face it, she has a hard time keeping her grubby little hands to herself, though to be fair, she is VERY good at slathering hand sanitizer on those grubby little hands all the way up to her arm pits.

This party, or open house, or celebration or whatever, was on a Friday from 5pm to 9pm. We arrived at like 5:10. We planned it this way so that we wouldn’t have to breathe the stench of a thousand other maniacs as the evening wore on.

I didn’t tell Tom about this little venture into the world of semi-socializing until the morning of the event. No need to stress the poor man any more than he already stresses. Dude needs to turn off the damned television, is what I’m saying.

I mentioned the grad party as I was walking out the door to go to work that day. He gave me a look that said he doubted my sanity in this decision and I shrugged and said, “We have to make an appearance. We’ll be careful.”

He retorted, “Well, since you’re not asking permission, I guess I can’t say anything.”

Permission?!? Hahahahaha. I am so sure.

Any of you out there who actually know me in real life, can you even imagine me asking permission for something like this? And let’s remember, I’m not contrary, not at all, but if he were to try and tell me we couldn’t go, guess where we’d go and stay for HOURS? And if that isn’t just cutting off my nose to spite my face, I don’t know what is.

I just laughed at him because, yeah, okay, I’ll ask permission.

I think he was sort of joking but I also know he really didn’t think it was a good idea for us to go.

Guys…will this ever end? Will we ever get back to just living our lives? I just wanted to drop off a card with some money in it and tell this young lady I was happy for her. We didn’t hug, we didn’t shake hands, we didn’t eat a ‘walking taco.’ Hell, we didn’t even stick around for cake. That’s what this pandemic is doing to us, it’s taking away our CAKE.

Olivia has seventh grade orientation on the Monday before the girls go back to school. Tom will not be attending this orientation. He feels (and rightly so, if I’m perfectly honest) that if everyone is smart, one parent will attend with their child. This will limit the number of people attending and will hopefully aid in social distancing.

So I’m taking Liv to her seventh grade orientation. Because you know me. I don’t miss this sort of thing. I’m THAT mom. And I never even asked permission before I became THAT mom.

Schooled

Gotta go back, back, back to school again...Ahem, sorry for the little Grease 2 flashback.

We’ve been talking about school for months now, right?

The girls’ last day of school was Friday, March 13. Sure, sure, they did online school until the end of May but please. That hardly counts.

It’s as if they’re currently on week 20 of spring break.

I’ve been waiting for the school to get their ‘reopening plan’ together and posted.

It’s happened. They posted it on July 30th.

The gist is the school will do their best to clean, clean, clean common surfaces. Kids will be encouraged to social distance as much as possible. Masks will be encouraged throughout the day, obviously during lunch masks will be impossible but the school will attempt to keep kids in the same groups at all times.

So…we’ll see.

About five days after the school dropped their reopening plan, Tom asked, “So, when does the online schooling start back up for the girls?”

*aside: He asked me this at 6:48am on a Tuesday (fucking Tuesdays). I’d just put my phone in my purse and was getting ready to walk out the door.*

I paused, put my purse down and went to the kitchen table where I’d laid the letter we’d received the day before addressed to “The Parents of Olivia Ordinary”. It was informing us of a parent/student meeting on August 17 for students transitioning into seventh grade. Alongside this letter were copies of both girls’ immunizations from our family doctor’s office. I am taking those to the school to have the nurse confirm that both girls are up to date on their vaccinations.

Look at me, all on top of shit these days.

I also mentioned the text we’d received the day before informing us of the day and time we were to drop off O’s Chromebook.

At this point, it occurred to him that there was, apparently, not going to be online school this year, that the girls are going to be IN school.

He mused, “Yeah, Olivia probably would do better if she were in school.”

You think?

I blinked at him. Where has he been these last twenty weeks?

I mean, seriously?

Was he not there during the tearful days that I was at home trying to keep her on task, both of us at our wit’s end, slowly losing our minds?

Can he not see the state of her cuticles, as she picks them bloody from the anxiety she’s feeling these days?

She needs the routine of school. She needs to be around her peers, even if through masks. She needs the patience of those teachers who know her, who care about her, who are trained to help her. She needs to be away from the news and the murder and the crime shows that are constantly blaring from the television in our family room day in and day out.

Yeah, she’s going to school. I hope and pray it’s the best decision. Obviously, remaining home and waiting out this virus would be best for all but…that just doesn’t feel possible right now, not for any of us. And it’s a shame that we’re having to choose between our physical health and our mental health.

Sigh…it feels very much like we’re damned if we do and damned if we don’t.

One Headlight

We keep a running list of items needed. You empty the box of Cheezits? Put it on the list that’s always on the microwave with seven pens, six of which don’t write. If you’re me, you will always have to try all seven pens to fine the ONE the works. But you won’t bother to throw away the six that don’t work. I mean, who do you think you are?

One recent Saturday, I went to get the grocery list and found Tom’s debit card on top of it with an item (or two?) listed. A stop at Auto Zone was going to be necessary to pick up this particular item.

He’d written “headlight bulbs, set of two, for 2012 Chevy Equinox.”

I was immediately disgruntled.

Wait. I know. Let me acknowledge right here that I KNOW I’m a brat. I also know that I’m spoiled.

But seriously, what the hell is the point of having a HUSBAND if said husband won’t go and fetch these sorts of things himself? So what if these particular bulbs were for MY car? Also so what if I didn’t even know I had a headlight out. I rarely drive after dark, so I had no idea how long I’d been driving with one headlight. Sue me.

So yes, since Tom was at the post office (as he is often on Saturday mornings) I had a mini tantrum over having to stop at Auto Zone and get bulbs for my car.

By the time he got home, which was right before the girls and I were leaving to go buy groceries…and stop at Auto Zone, I thought I’d gotten my little snit out of the way. I blandly said I’d seen the addition to the list and he joked that at least he wasn’t expecting me to go to Walmart and try and find the right bulbs myself, that at Auto Zone you just tell them what you need and they go get them for you. I may have rolled my eyes like a big old baby. I can’t be sure, I wasn’t looking in a mirror.

Apparently my ambivalence toward purchasing those bulbs came through, though, because we’d been on the road for maybe three miles (not long enough to cross the state line into Indiana) when Tom called.

Alyssa answered my phone because, hello, I was driving. She spoke briefly with her father.

When she hung up she said, “Dad said you don’t have to go to Auto Zone. He’s going to go to an antique store later today or tomorrow so he can stop and get the bulbs himself.”

Huh.

Well.

Never let it be said that I’m not contrary as hell.

Now that he’d said I didn’t need to stop at Auto Zone, guess who was going to Auto Zone.

My mom laughed at my bratty behavior and said that I was lucky to have Tom.

Yes, Mother, I know.

I really do know that. But I also STILL wish he’d just gotten the stupid bulbs, changed them and told me about it after. Sure, the trip into Auto Zone took less than five minutes but now I have to spend about five more minutes feeling bad for being a spoiled brat.

AND! And I had to go home and apologize to my husband for it. That’s just annoying.

Debunked

For the better part of 2020, Alyssa has been asking that we take down the bunkbeds in her room.

They stood in a corner of her room, taking up space and just being used as storage for her plethora of stuffed animals.

She’d had a full-sized bed in there for three years, so the room was pretty cramped.

Each time she’d mentioned taking the bunkbeds down, Tom would tell her that he needed to take pictures of the beds put together so he could list them for sale. He also listed not having anywhere to store the frame and mattresses once we took them down.

She recently asked again, saying that I’d said she could store everything in my room for the time being. He told her that once she got the bed cleaned off, he’d take pictures and we’d go from there.

When she got home from work on a Sunday, I told her to go take everything off the beds and let her dad take the pictures.

He went up, took the pictures, came back down and said something snippy about having to move crap from under the bed.

Sigh.

Then he said he’d go find an Allen wrench so we could start dissembling the bed frame.

Well.

Guess who else in this house has Allen wrenches!?!

I scurried up those stairs and fetched tool box. No, it’s not pink.

Alyssa and I were well on our way to finding the correct wrench when Sir Thomas made his way back up the stairs with his own Allen wrench set.

As he and Lyss worked to loosen the bolts I asked if I should get a baggie for the hardware.

The response I got was a VERY short, “Are you asking her?”

Alyssa and I shared a look. That response was so out of proportion to the question I’d just asked that I simply said, “Okay then. I’ll go get a baggie.”

I returned shortly with a baggie in which we put the bolts as they came out of the bed.

Sir Snips-a-lot was all giggles by this time. Apparently, the mood had passed.

I mildly mentioned that maybe he hadn’t needed to be quite so irritable with me. He apologized and we moved on.

The bed came down and the room has been rearranged to the teenager’s liking.

The next morning, I received another apology for the biting remark said during the takedown of the bunkbeds.

I knew we were pushing him to do something he didn’t really want to do but in the end, it took about a half hour of his time. So…I accepted his apology and all’s well in the Ordinary household.

Smelly

Olivia and I go to my mom’s house at least twice a week during the work week.

I walk in the door each afternoon around 5pm and she greets me with, “Can we got to Gram’s?”

Sometimes I groan and tell her that I’m tired and just want to be home.

But other times, I hand her my phone, tell her to call Gram and see if she even wants company (if she’s home, she’s ALWAYS up for our visit) and off we go.

I do realize that O is stuck at home all day every day and so our visits to Gram are her way out of those four walls. Poor kid has had quite the sucky summer.

One recent afternoon we arrived at Casa Gram’s and found the dear woman hard at work canning relish. Olivia walked in and gagged at the smell. There was a strong smell of vinegar in the air.

After about fifteen minutes, Liv was able to remove her mask (she was ever so glad she had it) and declared that she’d gone ‘nose-blind’ and was able to breathe without gagging. She’s a funny girl.

After an hour or so Olivia and I left and once in the car, I declared that our car smelled very much like Gram’s relish. It wasn’t so much unpleasant as it was…there.

I smelled myself just to make sure the smell really was from the relish and not because my deodorant had stopped working.

Yikes. I reeked.

When we got home, I immediately added ‘new deodorant’ to our grocery list. I figured my body had done that thing where it just stops letting the deodorant work and my natural stench was pushing its way through. Not a pleasant thought. I wondered if I’d stunk all day at work but everyone was just too polite to say anything. What a horrible thought.

I have this real fear of being the stinky girl that everyone notices but no one lets in on the secret of the stench.

But wait! After dinner (and being disgusted by my own smell) I went up to take a shower and de-stink myself.

Guess what?

When I took off my shirt and sniffed myself sans shirt, there was no stink. I didn’t have horrible body odor after all.

I retrieved the shirt I’d just shed and sniffed. Yuck!

It wasn’t me. It was the shirt. The shirt I’d been wearing at my mom’s had absorbed ALL THE SMELLS and was horrible.

But man was I relieved to not be the stinky chick. If people at work are talking about me (and I seriously doubt they are. I try hard to blend into the woodwork) it’s not because I’m smelly. I take a lot of comfort in that knowledge.

I’m leaving ‘new deodorant’ on the grocery list, though. I’m going to buy a brand I don’t currently have so that I have new on hand just in case my current choice does stop working.

One can never be too prepared when it comes to stink prevention.

This is Not a Political Blog...

Okay, I realize that this is NOT a political blog. But I think everyone who reads what I write here can probably guess where I stand on the current administration.

While my family and those close to me are very aware of my opinion of our current ‘leader’, the rest of the world, as in acquaintances and co-workers, probably aren’t. This is mostly because I am not a ‘shout it from the rooftops’ type.

But…I can barely stand the masks several co-workers are wearing these days. These masks have 45’s name and the numbers 2020 on them. Ugh!

I try and imagine if I were to wear a “Biden – 2020” mask to work. Wouldn’t that be fun?

But see, it’s not so much that I’m a Biden fan. I’m more of a “I will vote for anyone who is NOT our current president.”

Let’s all remember that any vote for Biden this November is a vote AGAINST 45. Can we all agree that a vote against the monster currently in the Whitehouse is a good thing? If we can’t agree to that, I supposed we can agree to disagree but in this case, I will be thinking that you are wrong.

I simply cannot imagine how anyone can listen to that moron speak and NOT realize that he’s insane. He’s horrible. He’s a misogynistic, racist, homophobic asshole.

And right now, he’s ‘leading’ our country.

It makes me sick to my stomach to think of it and yet there are people wearing masks over their faces with his name on them.

I just…can’t.