April 5, 2020

Cat Pictures, Country Potatoes, and the Five Stages of Quarantine

"Seriously woman, you need to find a hobby!"

Day 23 of the Hostage Situation...err, I mean, family bonding time!

     I get to leave the house on occasion, so...uh...that's pretty cool. Grabbing groceries and the occasional curbside pickup for food are my only real reasons for going anywhere. The girls are happy to go with me, even if they stay in the car the whole time. People watching in a parking lot is still a change in scenery, and they are happy for any type of change at this point! 

     There have been a lot of great things coming out of this whole situation, in spite of all the fear and hopelessness the media often portrays. Parades are being organized for the kids who have birthdays and aren't able to celebrate. People are pitching in by sewing masks and delivering groceries to the elderly and people with already compromised health conditions. In so many ways, we are so fortunate and should see this situation for the gift that it is. We are spending more time with family and aren't so stressed out with the typical hustle and bustle that most of us normally endure. 

     In the beginning, I feel like our cats were pretty happy to have us here. Now, they seem over it. Take Theo, for example. His face in the photo above is pretty much his face these days. It's as if he no longer appreciates our presence! Right? I was surprised, too! I mean, he should feel loved when we are constantly picking him up, kissing him, and shoving our phones in his face to capture just how adorable he is. 

     On my last shopping adventure, I picked up a large bag of potatoes. I figure potatoes are something I don't ordinarily keep around because I get busy and forget about them if I don't use them right away. I normally buy smaller bags of them for a meal I know I will make in the next day or two, mostly  because I know myself and how easily I can forget about things like that. 

Seriously, have you ever forgotten about a bag of potatoes and then wondered why it smelled like a dead body decomposing somewhere in the pantry? 

     This morning, I decided to use a good amount of that bag of potatoes to make some country potatoes. BOY HOWDY! I never knew it took so long to make those stinking things! I'm not kidding, it took me a good two hours just to make those damn things. They turned out tasty, but I'm still not sure why it doesn't cost a hundred dollars to order them in a restaurant. I, for one, will have a whole new appreciation for those things when someone else makes them! I'm likely to never make them again after this.

     In spite of all the human kindness we have witnessed, the needed time with our immediate families, and some of the best memes I have ever seen, what we are all experiencing, in one way or another, is grief. We are grieving all the things in our lives we don't have, like social interaction. Grandparents cannot hug their grandchildren, no one can just decide to meet up with a friend for a cup of coffee, and many cannot do their jobs, resulting in no paycheck. I've also noticed a pattern in how people deal with this quarantine, which is so similar to how people deal with grief in general.

The Five Stages of Quarantine

1) Denial
At first, it was really tough to wrap our heads around the fact that this whole quarantine thing is real. This has never happened in my lifetime, since nothing this tragic has ever been this close to home for most of us. Is this really happening, or am I dreaming? Is Ashton Kutcher going to pop out and tell us we've all been Punk'd? No gatherings more than 50 people? That shouldn't change things too much, I guess. Should it? Either way, this will all blow over in a few weeks and life will go back to normal. 

2) Anger
We start to feel angry because things in life that are normally as plentiful as we'd like are severely limited. If this doesn't end, high school and college seniors will be robbed of a proper graduation ceremony. And what about parties? People have to work hard to get to this point, but what will it mean without being able to celebrate it with their friends and families in the traditional ways? Sports are put on hold, both school and travel. Who could have predicted that many of these kids' last practice would be their last practice for the school year? What about birthdays? While I tend to think most of us go overboard to celebrate our kids' birthdays, even a simple cake and ice cream celebration with family and a few friends is off the table. People began judging each other about how they live their lives, if they aren't practicing proper social distancing. Public shaming begins to get more and more common. My girls were getting angry that I wouldn't let them hang out with friends anymore and we argued about it a lot. 

3) Bargaining
We start looking for loopholes. We try to justify going places and seeing people because we "feel fine." While that's certainly commendable, this virus is known for allowing people to feel perfectly fine and still be contagious. While you are fine, how many people do you come into contact with? This is a situation that no one has really been through before, so it's hard to wrap our brains around it and take it seriously. I mean, we are now looking toward  introverted, agoraphobic germaphobes for guidance. There is a small portion of the population that is truly living their best lives right now, with all the social pressures and obligations being on hold right now. 

Has anyone reached the end of Netflix yet? I feel like we're almost there! 

4) Depression
We feel really sad that we realize this is our new, even if temporary, normal. Will things ever truly return to normal? Will my children EVER go back to school? Why do we even get dressed each day? (spoiler alert: most of us don't!)  Do you realize that many of the aspects of the lifestyle we are forced to abide by are also on the list as symptoms of depression? People who suffer from depression likely aren't getting the social support they need. People who thrive on social interaction are also getting depressed. Thanks to social media, FaceTime, Skype, and Zoom, people can still connect with others. It's important that people reach out and do whatever they can to not feel so isolated during this strange time in our lives. Fresh air, sunshine, and exercise ALWAYS help, if even just a little. 

5) Acceptance
This will not last forever, but this is how things have to be right now. And it's totally worth it if we are truly able to contain this crazy virus that has now affected everyone in one way or another. The girls no longer argue about seeing their friends. 14YO has started baking. She has also become nocturnal, spending the nights baking cookies and drinking milk, based on how quickly we've been going through butter and gallons of milk recently! 17YO has rearranged her room multiple times, even painting the blades of her ceiling fan and moving shelves around. When she heads toward her room with a power drill, we don't question it. She knows what she wants to do and will figure out how to do it, always leaving things better than she found them. 

     In the meantime, kids are being guided through their education by their teachers, at a distance, and their day-drinking parents, in the home. There really are no rules anymore! Up is down, down is up! The things that are normally necessary to be healthy could possibly kill you, and the people you love. You are more likely to be negatively judged for standing too closely to another person than for staying in the same clothes for days at a time or consuming alcohol early in the day. Still, the store shelves are empty of toilet paper, bleach, Lysol, and hand sanitizer. The market has been disrupted, especially concerning toilet paper. People panic-bought it all in the beginning of this thing, which now results in people panic-buying it whenever they can find it. As long as I have a couple of week's worth on hand, I'm not going to stress about it. Between watching Tiger King, seeing all the memes about washing hands, touching your face, and toilet paper, I will continue to be entertained by how different people are handling things...especially the ones making the memes. KEEP 'EM COMING!