Not a Wasted Word

Today was a good day. My daughter’s sleep over was a huge success. The girls had a ton of fun and my daughter was over the moon. I was asleep by 12:30am and got to sleep until 8:45am! No one needed anything in the night.

This morning was low key. The girls played some MarioKart and Nerf wars. They got picked up at around noon and I left to run at 1pm. It was beautiful out and my run felt great. I was so happy to be out in the sunshine. I felt like I could run forever.

When I got home my husband left to see a friend. He’s been out three of the last four evenings. I’m so happy he’s joining the world again. He seems happy too. I mean he’s concerned. And confused. But we keep reminding ourselves that our kids are fully vaccinated. We waited all this time for that, to start living our lives again, and it finally happen. And yes, there is a new variant, and things are about to get really crazy again, but if we keep ourselves sequestered away, there will truly be no end in sight for us. At least no end we can articulate.

We are still being cautious. We are still avoiding really risky situations. But we are also engaging with people again. We are making meaningful connections with friends we care about in ways that might expose use to Covid. And that’s okay.

My kids and I watched 8-Bit Christmas together tonight. It’s kind of a modern remake of A Christmas Story. It’s certainly not the best movie ever made, but neither is it the worst. I enjoyed it. My daughter and I cried.

And then my son had his annual meltdown before Christmas. It’s a whole week away! How will I make it! I have to admit, I don’t love when Christmas is a whole week into the break. I don’t love when we go back right after New Years either. It’s not the ideal timing, and this week will likely feel looong around this house. But I hope we (::cough:: my son ::cough::) can find a way to enjoy it. To revel in the anticipation instead of dread it. We shall see.

But today was a good day. I want to hold on to the good days. One thing about omicron is that it all feels incredibly tenuous. Who knows what tomorrow will hold. Who knows when a positive test in our family, or even the family and friends that orbit us, will turn everything upside down. I find myself wondering if everything we have planned for the next week will come to pass. The week after Christmas feels very far away. So much could happen before then.

So I’m going to hold on to the good days. And today was one of them.

Yesterday I served almost 100 cups of hot chocolate. After each class finished their assessment, they got to take a cup outside to enjoy it. And as I sat outside with them, I realized that I haven’t seen most of their faces. It’s surprising to me how unrecognizable many of them are without their masks, and how the part of their face that I’ve never seen looks NOTHING like what I was (subconsciously) imagining.

It’s crazy to think that, four months into the school year, I don’t know what most of my students even look like. It’s even crazier to think that I’ll never really see their faces for the entire school year.

Because I don’t think I will ever see their faces. Not in front of me while I teach. Before omicron I thought maybe, by the spring, the mask mandate at school would be lifted. It felt like a long shot, but still possible. Now I don’t think there is any possibility of masks not being worn at school. An entire school year of masked teaching. After an entire school year of online teaching. When I say it like that, I get really depressed.

But at least we’re in person. I’m actually wondering if that will continue to be the case with this new variant. I had never considered that a possibility this school year, but after reading a bunch of articles this morning, I think it might be. At the very least, I think it’s very possible that a single school could get shut down for a couple of weeks if too many staff are out after testing positive, or if a bunch of kids are getting it from each other at school (that staff situation feels way more plausible).

But maybe those masks, that obscure my students faces, will allow us to keep the status quo. I think we’ll know by the end of January how this will affect in person learning. I’m sure a TON of kids will be out in January because of testing positive or living with someone who has tested positive. So much travel is happening over this break. So many indoor, maskless meet ups.

And I’m not judging any of that, it’s just a fact. My sister is flying from London, where omicron is spreading like crazy. I plan to spend lots of time with her the first week she’s in town, when she can’t know yet if she got Covid before she left (but not early enough to test positive before flying – she does need a negative test to board the plane) or on the super long flight full of other people from London. I’m not waiting until half her trip is over to see her and I’m not wearing a mask when I’m around her either.

Tonight my daughter’s three best friends are sleeping over. On Monday I’m taking my kids to Dave and Buster’s. These are the things they’ve been waiting so long to do, and since they are officially (as) “fully protected” (as they are every going to be) now is the time to indulge them. I think after these initial splurges we will go back to be pretty cautious; I do not plan on visiting Dave and Busters again during the break, or having any kids spend the night after their holiday travels. We won’t be eating indoors or seeing movies at the theater, which is a bummer because Spiderman looks really good. We will be visiting with my parents and my sister inside without masks. We will be going out with friends in some public indoor situations. These are new experiences for us, and while we won’t get to enjoy them like we might have (there will be more anxiety and second guessing to be sure), we aren’t going to shut down again. At least not yet.

Today my kids are at school and I’m home. I have some tests to grade (I got through the big assessments already! Woot!) and a lot of cleaning to do. I’m thankful to have the day to get shit done, before two weeks of holiday craziness. It’s nice to feel like I can get slightly ahead before it gets totally nuts.

How are you feeling on the eve of this holiday season?

I don’t write much our pets. They don’t do much but to us have they have big personalities and are the subject of a crazy amount of our family communication. We talk about them constantly, even though they are rarely ever doing anything that warrants commentary.

But then yesterday this happened. It pretty much made my week.

When we first got the dragon I wanted them to be friends so bad. I knew it would never happen, so I didn’t really try, but yesterday gave me hope that maybe it could. In the past the dragon was stressed out by the cat, but yesterday he was totally chill despite the cats thorough olfactory investigation.

If I could these two to cuddle I would lose my mind.

Maybe some day. A girl can dream.

Things are looking pretty grim, but every once in a while I feel a glimmer of hope.

Today, on my way home from the holiday work party (which was fine), I saw this from my car window. I pulled over to get a picture because rainbows are very rare around these parts.

I just wanted to share it, in case anyone else needs a pick-me-up.

The winter break is fast approaching, and I do not feel like I have a handle on how those two weeks are going to play out. My sister is in town – I haven’t seen her in two years! – so I want to make sure I know what the f*** I’m doing for those two weeks.

But there is so much to do at work before Thursday. And after actually because three of my classes are finishing an assessment on Thursday. It’s easy to just keep plowing through work stuff and leaving the Xmas break for later.

But “later” will be too late! So I need to take some time to sit down and plan some shit. Maybe tomorrow. If I just think of a couple things I want us to do and then ask her what days she might want to do them, that would make me feel better.

I don’t really have much to say tonight. December has been kind of bust as far as decent posts go. I was distracted by the martial arts test prep and then so depleted once it was over. It was like my brain space just went derp (as my daughter likes to say).

I will say that our holiday party got messed up because of the rain and I’m a lot more disappointed about it than I expected. We were supposed to have the party at a staff members (big, beautiful $3+ million dollar) house but now there is just lunch at school and then meeting at a bar spot some where. I was already really frustrated that they were having it on Wednesday when we have school again on Thursday (why?!) and now it just feels like a PTA sponsored lunch, except we’re all paying for it via our social committee dues. And then we have to go pay more money to be at a bar in the middle of the day. Ugh.

I really wanted a chance to socialize with other staff but I feel like that is not really going to happen in this situation and it bums me out. I’m so isolated at my job, I’ve been trying hard to go to social stuff with other staff, and the holiday party has traditionally been really fun. I’m annoyed it ended up being such a big fat bummer this year.

I have no plans with my friends either because different people will be seeing family during different parts of the two weeks so it didn’t really work out. Boo.

But it will be AMAZING to see my sister. I cannot wait for that. I gotta focus on the positive, because there is plenty of it at this time of year.

What do holiday parties look like around your parts this year? Anything you’re looking forward to?

I’m having an allergic reaction to the adhesive on a bandaid I had on my knuckles and it’s really bothering me. My right had is kind of a mess and I just want to go to bed. So I’m going to do that.

Good night.

Last night my husband and daughter met my son and I downtown (after the party at the dojo) to check out the Let’s Glow SF installations. There were four different shows projected on four different buildings downtown and we went to all of them. It was a really fun time.

The shape of each building really affected each show. I was impressed.

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This one, at 555 California, felt like it was trying a little too hard, but we still enjoyed it.

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The show on the Pacific Stock Exchange was really cool. They really used the columns to create interesting effects.

We missed part of the show at 1 Bush because a BART train was coming in 4 minutes or 30 minutes and it was already pretty late.

The Let’s Glow SF installations ended tonight, but it was pouring rain all evening so I’m assuming they didn’t even do them. I’m really glad we got to see them before they stopped. It’s nice to take advantage of living in the city.

I like holiday wear. I have a couple of Christmas shirts, a Fleece Navidad (with a lamb wearing a Santa hat) sweater and a Winter is Coming sweatshirt that I pull out after Thanksgiving every year. I also love loud leggings. I have quite a few crazy leggings that I wear pretty much all year round.

Today my son and I are attending the year-end party at the dojo and when he came out in his Christmas shirt I suddenly wanted very much to wear Christmas leggings under the simple black sweater dress I was going to wear. I texted my friends and asked if anyone had a pair I could borrow but they said no. I briefly looked online, but the cute light leggings I saw wouldn’t arrive before Christmas. I realized I wasn’t going to find leggings for today, but promised myself I would look later online for a pair that I could wear to work this coming week.

Then my son and I stopped by the dollar store on the way to the library and my son immediately pointed out a bin full of… drum roll please… holiday leggings!!! $3 holiday leggings!

At first I could only find 2XL and 3XL sized leggings but then I found the rack with S/M and M/L. I found a pair of S/M in each of the prints they had. I even found two pairs of cute Halloween leggings in my size! I got five pairs of leggings and a cute sweatshirt for my daughter, all for $18!

As I was walking home I started wondering what the chances were that these were actual leggings, that would fit right. Maybe they are weirdly capri leggings that no one wants because who can wear capris at Christmas? Or maybe even the S/Ms were really big. But when I got home and tried the first pair on, I was astonished to find that they are, in fact, real leggings, that come in the expected sizes! And they are so soft! I bet this pair is exactly the ones I wanted to order online!

I swear I feel like I won the lottery. I wanted a couple pairs of Christmas leggings, I couldn’t find any I loved online, then I walked by the dollar store and there was a giant bin full of them! And now I’m wearing these to the party today!

Talk about serendipity! I’m so super stoked! (And yes I realize I’m a weirdo for being so super stoked about this, but I am!)

It’s been chilly around these parts. I want to use the word “cold,” but I know that isn’t accurate since it never drops below 40* here. And yet, 52* feels cold for this wimpy ass Bay Area native.

It’s 5:50am and I’ve been up for an hour because it was freaking cold in our unit and I couldn’t sleep. At 5am the heat upstairs kicked on. We keep the thermostat at 58* at night because the kids can stay warm enough in their beds even if it’s really cold. 58* is low enough that the heat almost never kicks on before the thermostat changes to 63* at 7am. When I heard it rumbling at 5am I knew it was legitimately cold out.

The wall heater in our downstairs unit it broken and it gets COLD down there. We should probably get it fixed but it’s hard to commit to spending what will surely be many hundreds of dollars on a heater we’ll actually NEED only a few times a year. We do have some space heaters and it’s probably time to pull those out, but I hate to use the electricity to run them.

At school we have to keep our windows and doors open and lately that has been quite unpleasant for the kids. The heater is blowing all day but it’s still cold when the wind is blowing across the back of the classroom between the two open doors. Luckily I have flexible, free seating so kids can move themselves when they want to. It’s weird how willing they are to bitch about the cold and yet how unwilling they are to move to a different seat (or just dress more appropriately!) Just kidding. That’s not weird for middle schoolers at all. (Sigh.)

This whole keeping-the-windows-and-doors-open-and-blasting-the-heaters-all-winter feels like a very unproductive policy. It seems like just upgrading our HVAC systems would make more sense. But that requires more money up front and god knows public schools don’t have that.

They were talking big talk about how they had someone coming out to look at the HVAC systems so that we’d be safe inside with doors and windows closed once fire season ramped up and our air quality got dangerous. But the atmospheric river that came through in early fall put an end to fire season early and we never ended up having any high AQI days. We never heard anything else about the HVAC renovations after that.

Evidently another atmospheric river will be coming through next week. Should make for an interesting couple of days. Besides that big dump we got in early fall we’ve had almost no rain and we’re still technically in a severe drought. I hope we start getting more consistent rain this winter. Huge drops of double digit inches and then nothing for months is obviously not sustainable.

Well it’s 6:07am and technically I should be up getting ready. Also the heat, which I turned to 60* when I came upstairs, went off so this spot on the floor in front of the vent is no longer as appealing.

Happy Friday everyone! Stay warm!