"Q3" - Wednesday, March 18, 2020

Quarantine Day 3

Objective: I will allow reality to sink in while maintaining calm and optimistic.

Okay, I will need to work on that "optimistic" thing. These last few days were strange days for me, so let me give you a short synopsis:

Saturday, March 14
They told us to report to work on Monday and Tuesday, but students were to remain at home. Schools began to close down across the Nation. Maybe this will only be two or three weeks. Yeah, three weeks at most.
We set national emergencies aside; Ms. Harmon, Mr. Colella, and I meet up in Joshua Tree National Park. We made the usual comments about how ridiculously crowded the Park was with tourists.
   "I thought they'd all be hunkered down in their L.A. homes; why are they up here?"
   "Well, being outdoors is still promoted as a safe activity. And it's always better to be outside than inside!"
   "True enough. Plus I heard that when they were dealing with the Spanish Flu that they would wheel patients out of the hospital and had them sun-bathe. Did they know about ultraviolet rays back then?"
We hiked along an old, unmarked trail that Mr. Colella knew. Ms. Harmon and I chatted about what to plan for our ELA students. We bouldered, we wandered, we quieted our worries, and we allowed ourselves to appreciate nature's beauty around us.

Immersed in the present, I saw a tiny arch, barely balanced against gravity. It seemed tenuous, like so many of our plans right now. In its pose I found solace; we can be perched upon the edge of chaos, but we can also hold on to our own inner peace. We are here--very much present, together in this moment, and that alone should be enough.

Sunday, March 15
I woke up and still felt a little "sniffly". Still, a head cold sure beats COVID-19. Mr. Colella went for a quick, solo dual sport ride, enjoying the tacky dirt (rain in the desert creates the best riding surfaces). He launched himself off a dirt berm, but landed in a deep mud puddle. Did you know that motorcycles stop really fast when they hit deep water? It's true. Mr. Colella folded over his handlebars on impact, but incredibly stayed on his Beta 500. He rode home shortly after that.
Groceries. We resigned ourselves to the chaos that would be grocery shopping. We agreed that we only wanted to buy would we would need for the next two weeks (no "panic purchasing").

• Corned beef (almost St. Patrick's Day)
• Potatoes 
• Cabbage 
• Onions
• Garlic 
• Carrots
• Oranges
• Butter
• Oatmeal 
• Mini cream puffs (a weakness of mine)
• Two one-gallon jugs of water ("Limited to one-per purchase, ma'am." Hmm, that's new.)
• Oat milk

We noticed all of the things that people had left on the shelves of Stater Brothers; peanut butter cereal, cheddar cheese Cup-o-Noodles, vegetable stock, and everything bagels. I hadn't even realized that Cup-o-Noodles came in cheddar flavor.
At 4:06pm, my cell phone rang. It was MUSD. A text-to-voice, automated call told me to not report to work tomorrow or Tuesday, but to check my email to see when I would next report to work. This is starting to feel very, very real. 
Mr. Colella made the corned beef a few days early, since he'll be working on St. Patty's Day. My inner Irish smiled at this very Americanized, very delicious meal.

Q1: Monday, March 16
I woke up and didn't get ready for school. Mr. Colella had this Monday off; in a sad twist of coincidence, he had taken this day off well in advance so he could go on a mini-vacation to Utah to ride slick rock on his dual sport. Intead, he made us coffee and corned beef hash (flippin' delicious) for breakfast. We speculated on time frames, national and local reactions, and monetary concerns.
Fully caffeinated, I wrote up a lesson for the week for my eighth grade ELA students, only to quickly be informed that the District will provide all Exploratory Educational Resources to the students. Okay, I'll comply, but what is my job right now? What should I be doing? 
As the sun rose higher in the brilliant, blue sky we took to the yard for some much-needed "screen free" time. I chuckled as I pulled mustard weeds, again thinking about my students who have started to learn about invasive species. Will they keep learning? Will they keep researching for their essays? I haven't even taught them how to create a Works Cited page yet! Even when I am out of the classroom, the Teacher in me never really turns off.
As the sun set, my inner night owl awoke. Normally my teacher bedtime is 8:30pm, without fail. Tonight I sat on the couch and read Neil Gaiman's graphic novel "The Sandman". It's about as dark as my mood and kept me reading until 11:30pm.

Q2: Tuesday, March 17
Mr. Colella heads off to the city of Palm Springs for work. As a building maintenance mechanic, he's considered essential personnel. I ask him to be extra careful as he sanitizes and locks up his once-public buildings. Palm Springs is shutting down hard; over 40% of their population is over the age of sixty, making this city incredibly vulnerable to COVID-19.
There is only one way that I will survive my routine-less life: a checklist.
I create two, actually. "Apocalypse Chores" and "Apocalypse Projects". The chores are boring: dishes, laundry, sweep, mop, vacuum. The projects are more fun because they take problem-solving and are normally reserved for summertime when I have enough time to complete them: create a tire-stop for my mountain bike; reorganize our library filing system; create a storage solution to my tow-hitch bike rack; clean out the shed.
But before I get to that, I need to clean out something else: my classroom. All teachers have a two-hour window to get their personal belongings from the classrooms, then they are not to return to school. Room 20 has been my home-away-from-home for five years now. I pack it up every year... in June! Not in March! Okay, okay. I'm not stripping the walls of posters. I'm not bringing my Class Library home in boxes. But, still, this feels weird. Surreal. I look at the date on the white board: Friday, March 13, 2020. Maybe that Friday the Thirteenth will be the most infamous of them all. Who knows? The date is reminiscent of the writing on the chalkboard of the Bodie schoolhouse. I shake off that thought. I grab my copy of "The Martian" and my teacher's edition of our textbook. I might soon be confined to my house, but I can still plan ahead and read a few of the stories from the text that I haven't gotten to yet.
At 4:10pm, MUSD sends out an "All Call" again. I am not to report to work tomorrow. Stay home. Stay healthy. Students will be provided review packets on the MUSD website.
I visit my younger sister, Ms. Brandt. We don't hug when we greet each other. We talk about our family. We talk about upcoming choices we'll have to make. We talk about our older sister, Courtney, who lives in Portland; she's just announced that she and her fiancé are postponing their April wedding. We Brandt sisters are heartbroken, but at least we are heartbroken together.

Q3: Wednesday, March 18
I wait for the sunrise to burst into color. It doesn't. The gray clouds reach out from both ends of the horizon, like two strong arms, enveloping our desert basin in a cold embrace. It's 40°. I step onto my patio and take a deep breath: it smells crisp, with the slightest suggestion of snow.
What a perfect day to go hiking!