Where were you when the lights went out?

As I noted in my last post, memory is a fickle thing.

Take the title of this missive, "Where were you when the lights went out?"  It's the title of a Doris Day movie. But it was also a sentence we had to diagram in 8th grade English. Francis Folkert was our teacher. Oh the giggling and snickers that came whenever someone had to read that sentence.

So while I'm on a memories thread, I think I'll continue.

My daughter said a friend was documenting what her family was doing during the COVID-19 lockdown. It is an effort to help her children remember what was happening in the world in 2020.

It's a good idea. I know my mother lived through a scarlet fever epidemic sometime during her childhood. Her father and brother stayed in a tent outside the house so they could continue to milk the cows and sell the milk. Her mother boiled all their clothing and bedding ... daily. Mom said it was the fever that left her deaf, but I'm not even sure that's possible. That is how Mom remembered it, but we all know...memory is a fickle thing. I would like to know more about it. I wish Grandma had kept a journal. I wish I had asked Mom more questions. I wish I knew which brother was home during this time. Our stories. Our memories.

So here is my journal for the Coronavirus, 2020. I have to wonder if 20 years from now how obsolete this blogging technology will be. I'll have to print it out and place it in my old-fashioned journal. My bit for posterity.

We have been in California for the winter. Rather than travel with our travel trailer this year we drove here and left our little Shasta trailer in Michigan for our son. Once again he found himself homeless and needed a place to stay. I'll be honest -- social services and local churches are not equipped to help the mentally ill and homeless. Prayers and vouchers don't get very far. People simply don't understand and I become bitter when I read self-righteous,  idiotic comments on social media.

So...this winter we have been staying with our daughter outside of San Diego. We are working out a plan to try to get back to Michigan to pick up a 1983 trailer we purchased while we were here. We had good friends check it out for us. I'm looking forward to fixing up the inside of the trailer once we get back-- that is if we can get back to Michigan. Tentative plans call for our leaving next week. We will have to keep a weather eye on the news and see what happens. It does not look promising and may be postponed for a while. It is what it is.

California went on a state-wide lockdown March 19. Michigan followed suit on March 23. I've called ahead to see if motels are open along the route. Not surprising I get the same response, "We don't know what is going to happen." Hmmm. None of us do.

As of this writing 30 states are on lockdown. What that means depends on who you ask. Supposedly only "essential" businesses are to be open. Bars and restaurants have closed. Carry out and fast food are still available. But the definition of "essential" is up for interpretation. For instance, JoAnn Fabric is open in some states and some stores have been closed by order of state attorney generals in others. Technically they do provide an essential service as people have been reduced to making their own protective masks. Doctor offices are closed. My sister works at a breast center in Holland. It is open a half-day a week for mammograms. Grime-filled convenience stores are open as are grocery stores. Wal-Mart has just implemented a policy where customers wait in line outside (six feet apart) and a few people are allowed in at a time. People are hoarding toilet paper and hand sanitizer. While there is not a shortage of food, some items such as flour, yeast and eggs are hard to find. Some grocery stores have established senior citizen hours for shopping as people over the age of 65 are considered "high risk" for the Coronavirus, or COVID-19. The homeless, often noticed but not really seen, have become bolder and more prevalent.Their makeshift cardboard "homes" covered with sheets and plastic tarps fill alleys and other sheltered places. Panhandling, however, has all but stopped. Schools have closed -- some for the remainder of the school year, some until mid-April, although we suspect most will end up closing until next fall.

Our grandchildren in Michigan are among those who are finished going to school for the remainder of the school year. The state has established guidelines for "remote learning." Three of them attended Paw Paw Public Schools and two attend Grand Haven Public Schools, the youngest is in pre-school.

Our oldest grandson is an 8th grader at Paw Paw Middle School, he and his sister, who is in 6th grade are able to continue classes using their school-provided Chromebooks. Our grandson told me he starts his day by "checking my Chromebook for the newest homework while eating breakfast and lounging in my PJs. When I"m done, I play the Xbox or Nintendo switch." His sister said she was "doing my daily assignments, having lots of bored moments and baking a lot of desserts." (My kind of woman). Their younger brother is in 4th grade. When it was announced that school would be closed (at first for 3 weeks) the elementary teachers made work packets for all the students in grades K-5. There was a designated day for parents to come pick up the work which was 3 packets for each week they were out of school. He told me "I like to start my day with silent reading and then I do my work packet assignments. After that, I spend the day doing whatever I want." His mother told me he misses the social interaction of school the most. She gets them outside for exercise. Our son (their father) is considered "essential" and still is able to go to work.

In Grand Haven our granddaughters are in 4th and 1st grade, and pre-school. Our son, who is working from home now, said it is hard to keep them motivated/focused to do their school work. "It seems to get a littler harder each day." Now that the weather is getting warmer in Michigan I see a lot of videos of the girls tree-climbing, enjoying bonfires and interacting from across the street with a neighborhood friend.

I have a niece who teaches fourth grade in Spring Lake, Michigan. She tells me she uses an app called Seesaw. "I post generic assignments for them and they can make posts. Fortunately our math curriculum was partly online to begin with so math hasn't changed much. I did send home math packets too. For reading I have them go on scavenger hunts in their books -- yesterday was find a simile -- and post a picture of what they have found. Other times it will be something like a name a character trait or describe the problem." She noted for the first few weeks of the school closure she had not been teaching new content  (with the thought they would be going back to school in mid-April). Since schools in Michigan have closed permanently she said she knows that will change.

In California, our grandsons are in kindergarten. Their teacher does two hours of instruction each day via Zoon -- an hour in the morning and an hour in the afternoon. The woman is a saint. Can you imagine trying to teach kindergarten children via video? They wiggle -- a lot. In the morning they learn to write sentences and are given an assignment to work on between class times. This week is spring break so there are no classes. When they go back to "school" on Monday,  they will continue with what they are doing but teachers will be meeting for three weeks to discuss curriculum. They are being proactive in the event schools do close for the remainder of the school year. At the end of  the three weeks -- assuming schools have been closed -- classes will be taught online for a grade.

I listened in as the boys' teacher discussed the school district's plan with parents via Zoom. People tend to amaze me. Parents were complaining about the amount of "screen time" the children were having. Seriously? Ummm. These children are in kindergarten. They can't exactly read assignments and do them on their own. Sigh. People make me sad. And unfortunately classes have to be geared to the lowest common denominator, in this case it's the parents.

Our two oldest grandchildren are in the workforce. Our oldest lives in North Carolina. They are on lockdown as well, but she and her boyfriend continue to work -- both in the food service industry, which is considered "essential." The younger of the two, who graduated in 2018, works for a cleaning service and has been laid-off. Her boyfriend works in a factory that supplies medical equipment and  is still working.

The rest of us are reading, challenging people on social media to post photos, whining about people challenging people to post photos on social media, watching TV and Netflix series (The Tiger King is really popular. Gross... but I watched it, so what does that say?) I'm making face masks for law enforcement officers who, like the rest of us, can't get masks. One would think.... oh never mind.

From reading posts on social media I see many parents are concerned for their children. They (the children) are scared, confused, and worried. I wish there were words of wisdom to impart, but it all sounds like platitudes.

But all is not doom and gloom. The sun still rises brilliant orange and sets deep red. Rains come and water the newly-planted grass seed in the yard. I keep on King to please stop trimming the rose bushes long enough so we can get just one bloom. We keep busy. We do things. We plan for a future when life will get back to normal. Or we look for a new normal where, perhaps, consumerism doesn't run rampant and perhaps we start to look for simpler things in life.

I'd like to invite you to leave a comment on this post to let us know how you are spending your time during the COVID-19 lockdown. We are all in this together.

Stay safe. Stay home. Be sane.