(Author’s Note: The CVC website has been down for awhile so the blog posts have been delayed.  This was written May 15 2020.)

Hello from Week Nine of (Productive?) Work from the Dining Room Table! Let’s look at the positives during this time.

I am happily watching spring bloom in front of my eyes. This is instead of suddenly looking out my car window and realizing we’ve gone from bare branches to full leaves without noticing the transformation. New tulips are being harvested from my garden daily and adding color to my “desk.” I can get Wi-Fi on my deck!

Homeschooling (a misnomer that would assume I was schooling my children) seems to be on track, especially with the Pass/Fail option lessening the pressure. God bless all the teachers.  Just WOW.

I’ve been able to work out for the first time since mid-March. This experience brought painfully home that frequent dog walking doesn’t do enough to keep the rest of you in shape.  I can barely sit down or shampoo my hair without gasping.

Speaking of hair, I got a haircut!  With my super short hair, I’m usually on a four-week trim schedule.  This appointment was double that and although I didn’t have pig tails yet, there was the potential.

The now-traditional Takeout Tuesday has the combo benefit of both getting me out of making dinner and supporting local restaurants.  Even when we go back to New Normal, I envision this new custom remaining.

We celebrated my nephew’s graduation from Sheridan College last weekend, complete with cap, gown and diploma. That was the scheduled date BC-19 so I thought we should forge on.  Trying to get the family on FaceTime, cue Pomp and Circumstance, and video him walking up the sidewalk and across the deck took a couple tries but was hysterical in the execution.

This weekend would have been UW’s graduation, so we’re headed to Laramie for a celebratory dinner with my niece. Her dad may be dining with us via FaceTime from Texas and her grandparents from Illinois, but it’s as close as we can get to the real deal.

Writing of, I’ve heard talk that high school and college seniors are whiners for complaining about missing state sports finals, or prom, or graduation.  Get over it, say grumpy adults who clearly were given the opportunity to choose whether to attend any of those events. Easy for them to say.

Sure, there are worse things occurring during this pandemic than not being able to attend senior prom or accept your diploma on the stage after years of striving. Does that make missing out on these seminal life events meaningless or trivial? It does not. There will always be someone who has it worse. This fact doesn’t mean your sadness is insignificant.

And that is my message for today. While I strive to be the Queen of Positivity, I too have been struggling throughout BC-19.  I try to focus on the good but there is no point in denying the bad.  Sometimes, you just need lean into the sadness, the grief, the unknowing, the change, the heavy, and the tears. These are hard times and the future is murky.  We’re doing the best we can and that’s all we can ask of ourselves and others.

We’re all in it together.