Shelter-in-place. I never thought we’d read those words in our lifetime. Or at least, not in the context of a pandemic. Maybe after an earthquake.
As of now, it really isn’t that bad. We can still go outside to exercise, walk the dog, and even shop for groceries. All in all, the situation could be worse.
But the biggest short term disruption is social – as in social distancing. Gatherings larger than 50 individuals are banned or canceled, for at least three weeks.
Oddly, the most intense effect of social distancing is a forced prolonged concentration of family members. Most families enjoy a standard schedule whereby at least one parent heads off to work and the kids head off to school.
This has led to some…concern, to put it mildly. School districts are scrambling to create flexible learning solutions. Parents are posting hourly schedules for their children to maintain normalcy, while adjusting to working from home. Most parents are not teachers and nobody expects you to be. And please don’t be upset at teachers or school districts and administrators for however they decide to handle the situation. Like you, they’re trying their best. So be kind to them. These are not normal times, so throw out the normal. Which brings me to the main points I’m trying to make with this post.
Be Kind To Yourself and Your Family. These next few weeks will be difficult for everybody, so please don’t set too high expectations for yourself and your loved ones. Nobody wanted this disruption and everybody’s stress levels are going to be through the roof.
You Have Time. Remember that thing you wanted to do. Or that project you wanted to start. Or that recipe you wanted to try. Go for it. You finally have the time.
Catch Up instead of Keep Up. Our normal schedules make for very little time to sit and catch up. Your kid or spouse can’t run off to school and work. So take advantage of the time. Catch up with your family at home or with extended family on the phone or FaceTime. Check up on loved ones.
Share the Load. My wonderful friends have been checking in with us. And we’ve been checking in on our friends. My standard response is, “We’re fine. Daddy Kamp has been preparing for this for years!” I’m not even sure what my response meant, but it somehow felt true. And yesterday I realized why. There are many reasons why Daddy Kamp became a thing. Becoming a better parent. Having a place to share my thoughts as I embarked on being a stay at home dad, if only to keep my sanity. Raising not so lame kids. One of the things I wanted to impress on my children is that there is a cost to everything. Lunches don’t just show up. Dinners don’t make themselves. Dog shit doesn’t jump into the trash. And while they couldn’t contribute much while they were younger, I wanted to show them how things got done around the house. My hope was that as they got older, they’d start sharing the load. If you can make breakfast, that’s one thing mom and dad don’t have to do. Learn how to clean your own bathroom. Running out of your favorite clothes won’t be a problem if you know how to do your own laundry. Parents don’t ever get bored, because there is always so much to do. So the more of the load you share, the cooler mom and dad become. Imagine that?
So parents, on top of all the things we have to worry about, we now have to worry about bored kids. But that’s one thing I don’t worry about. Because we’ve slowly been teaching our kids how to share the load. And now we get to reap the benefits of that. With everybody home, the daily workload has actually decreased and we get to do fun things together. On Sunday, we had a great time cleaning the house. We even played a board game to decide who got to choose which chores. We exercise together because you can’t share the load if you’re not fit. And the fitter your are, the more efficiently you can handle the loads. Which leaves more time for fun stuff like board games, DisneyPlus and music jams.
So how do we get here? Teach and be patient. Which is difficult because it takes time. But guess what. For the foreseeable future, we got nothing but time…
Nice! We’ve some some “schooling” today, got outside with the dog, made bread, had some discussions regarding finally building the Christmas gingerbread houses and are going to watch some Disney+. Whoop, whoop!
I’m torn about attempting the bread. It seems like tons of fun, but so many of our friends make good bread. Makes more sense to trade bread for cocktails or steaks.