This will be a series of unrelated paragraphs that having nothing to do with each other. And may not even make sense on their own. You’ve been warned.
It’s Thursday! (I’m writing this on Thursday afternoon.) I’m so happy when it’s Thursday afternoon because on Friday I only teach one class and that is a relief. Also next week I’m only giving my students an assessment, in “real time,” so I don’t have much independent work to create and finalize over the weekend.
Next week is also conferences, which are sure to be a total cluster fuck.
I did end up deciding that I need to bring down the volume of work I’m giving my students. I was pushing hard in September so they would be ready to learn about Día de los Muertos in Spanish and I believe we got there, and now I’m going to pull back. I’ve been showering them with praise for how much good work they’ve been doing and letting them know that we’ll be doing less moving forward. I hope they are feeling proud of themselves, along with relieved that Spanish won’t be as hard next month.
I invited my principal to my zoom today (mostly because we were using Pear Deck and I really want our site to buy us all Pear Deck so I don’t have to pay for it myself, so I wanted her to see how great it is) and she was super impressed with my class. It was nice to have an adult tell me I’m doing a good job. Teaching on zoom is so isolating, and it can really start to feel like you exist in a professional vacuum.
My son, who is in first grade, started reading the Dog Man books by himself. He’s also listened to the Captain Underpants audiobooks enough times that he can read those without much help. He is right on the cusp of really reading and I’m excited for him. Right now I’m incredibly grateful to Dav Pilkey for creating a set of books that make my 1st grade son incredibly excited to read.
My husband and I are refinancing our mortgage. Our new rate will be 2.7%! We thought we had an amazing rate at 3.25% but 2.7% is pretty great. We’ll continue to pay at our current rate (the same monthly amount) because we have the money, but it will be nice to have the option to pay $500 a month less if our financial situation ever changes. We are also saving to do some work on our back room which has water damage, so hopefully we won’t have to take out a HELOC later.
Our coffee maker broke last week and we could not commit to buying another one. The level of indecision, for a fucking coffee maker, was not proportional to the importance (or cost!) of of decision at all. And for two weeks I was using our aeropress to make coffee in the morning, which was a total pain in the ass for two people. And still I couldn’t commit to a coffee maker. It was totally infuriating. And I think it speaks, yet again, to the fragility of my mental state.
We did, eventually, buy a coffee maker and it came today. Hallelujah!
My son’s backyard play date, my daughter’s running club, and my own street side dinner with friends, were all cancelled today because our AQI is back in the orange, and eventually red, today. It’s been almost two months of having to watch our air quality and it’s really wearing on me. (And yes I know how lucky I am that my house hasn’t burned down, but it’s still hard to have the specter of fires looming over us after all these weeks).
Honestly, the worst part is that my house is so hot and stuffy and I can’t open any windows and there is nothing else to do because we have no air conditioning. It was only 75* in SF but my house feels so stuffy. Ugh. I just want to open a window.
My friends and I had a text chain today about whether or not we need to stockpile before the election. Actually it was more about what we should stockpile, not whether or not we need to. Like do we need to buy tons of water, or just food (and booze 😉 obviously. It’s a total mind fuck to realize that I had a completely serious conversation about that, in the United States of America. I have accepted that everything I learned about my country was a lie, and it only functioned as long as it did because most people in power followed a set of unsaid “rules” that weren’t actually written anywhere and don’t actually need to be followed (or can be changed at the whim of those in power), and once someone who doesn’t care about them gets into power, the whole thing comes crashing down. The most troubling thing is that even if the Democrats gain control in November, and eventually are allowed to take that control, I don’t believe they will take the steps necessary to ensure this won’t happen again, and Republicans, who represent the minority in our country, will continue to exert their control over a majority that doesn’t agree with them or share their values.
I was realizing recently that if I could choose to be fast forwarded to the eventual outcome of the election (be that November, December, January or beyond) or the conclusion of the pandemic, I would choose the election in a heartbeat. I think that really puts into perspective how stressful our current political situation is, because that pandemic is no picnic.
Speaking of the pandemic, my husband wants us to go into super strict quarantine for two weeks so we can spend some time with his parents. His father is 75 and they have been very cautious about their exposure – they get their groceries delivered and really only leave their house to bring our kids some magazines once a week, and even then they only pass them to us from the car. We would have to quarantine as strictly as they are to see them, which would be a big change for us. I’m not entirely thrilled to go back to never leaving my house again, but of course I’ll do it for my husband, kids and in-laws. I think we’d spend a lot of time with them for 1-2 weeks, and then go back to grocery shopping, and seeing the kids” friends in outdoor spaces with masks on for a while again.
San Francisco and San Mateo counties are back in the “red” pandemic wise which means that schools can open again if they are following county health guidelines. Private schools up and down the peninsula are opening, and even some public schools in places like Menlo. Our district’s union has been negotiating a possible return and already it’s getting ugly. I am not looking forward to whatever fight between teachers, the district, and parents, is sure to ensue.
I’m tired. So very, very tired.
Happy Friday everyone.
What an enormous amount of stuff you have gotten done.
Yes, the coffee maker IS a big stress these days … because we all are on the ragged edge of everything. And, please, what is on the group stock pile list? (beyond water??? Please share the thinking on this one, are people thinking the water system will shut down? Booze I understand. Is it food or home supplies like soap? Is reason open warfare in the streets or shortages in grocery stores. ) Clearly I have missed some important things to panic about and frankly I thought I was covering 101% of bases for fear. I am up in middle of night because…. scared by it all.
But then Covid in White House and implications about VP in charge and election and STRESS. HUGE STRESS. TERRIBLE STRESS.
Love that your son is developing a reading habit!!!! HURRAH for all of you. You dealt with a refi on the house on top of everything else! Impressive and good rate!!! FABULOUS rate. AND, praise re your teaching. SO PLEASED for you, you have worked so hard it is grand it was acknowledged and seen. Virtual conferences…. maybe it will be like phone/video dr apts… which seem to go well … until they tell you to show up anyway after all.
The re-opening of schools issues are huge. I will simply say I am wishing good fortune on every teacher and all families. Looks rugged to me, very hard on everyone and everyone’s nerves.
An all-out effort and then getting to see and be with your in-laws is a loving and difficult thing to do. Know what it would mean to everyone, but also how hard the isolation process would be and maintaining the isolation for a time. Tough choices.
THANK YOU for writing. I am up in middle of night because stressed, finding you here helped.
Coming by to catch up. It sounds like you’ve been managing pretty well, given the complete shitstorm that we’ve been living through recently. Hallelujiah, indeed, for a coffee maker … it’s the little things lately that bring me joy, just as it’s the little things that can totally break me.
I hadn’t thought to stockpile in advance of the election, but then I also hadn’t really believed that I needed to stockpile when the pandemic first hit the U.S., and I felt like the rug had been pulled from under me … it really is bizarre to be having conversations about stuff like this in this country, now. My students from overseas are looking at us in pity; while they desperately miss their peers on campus, some of them are aslo really, really glad they’re not here. (We’re fully remote, except for a few hundred students on campus, and I hear you about the work never really being done … though I also hear the worry about what it could look like as you plan for reopening. My kids’ schools here are hybrid, and that’s been a crazy situation, too. Honestly, I don’t think they’re learning as much as they could if they were just in one place every day, hard as it would be to be on zoom all day long…)
Sending you tender thoughts.