Suicide Cult

We’ve become a suicide cult.

First our alleged leadership ignored the warnings of a growing threat from the virus and did nothing. They had months to prepare but they did nothing. Then they delayed asking people to isolate and spouted absolute bullshit about how the virus would magically disappear in the Spring. When things finally were shut down they chomped at the bit wanting to open things up again immediately. The gasbag in chief started stating it was time to open up and some fool states did it.

We had one governor literally saying older Americans should be willing to die gasping for air to preserve the economy. Same governor now has his state devolving into an absolute medical hellscape but won’t ask people to stay at home again until it gets, much, much worse.

People are becoming infected at a faster and faster rate, the number of new cases is just exploding and the death toll keeps rising while these monsters tell their followers not to wear masks. I don’t think these “leaders” are stupid. I think they want us all to die. I think they are actively trying to destroy this country. They’ve turned their followers into a suicide cult of massive proportions. I do not understand how anyone can keep following them, keep listening to their patently bad advice. But I know that bad advice is spreading.

Remember the advice? Stay home if at all possible, wear a mask whenever you must go out, stay at least 6 feet away from others… that advice? They are dialing that back while this virus keeps spreading!!!! It is by no means contained at all and the CDC is saying those precautions might not be necessary!!! WTF?!?! They think the only answer now is herd immunity. Because we did such and absolutely shitty job and failed to prevent or contain the spread, and because a vaccine is probably a year or more away, they must have decided that herd immunity is the only card they can play. That is going to mean catastrophic rates of infection and a tidal wave of death. The number of cases is going to overwhelm and crush our medical system. The number of deaths is going to break our capacity to deal with the bodies. Remember NewYork? The unrefrigerated truck parked in the street filled with bodies? Remember Ecuador? https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/03/americas/guayaquil-ecuador-overwhelmed-coronavirus-intl/index.html That will be us.

And do you really think the economy won’t tank when this all goes down? Are you thinking; “Oh sure, lots of people will die but the economy will be ok.” Think again. This is going to get so ugly. When more and more people get sick our industries are going to come to a crashing halt. I can’t even imagine how bad this is going to get, and I’ve got a good imagination.

How Not to Customer Service

The hottest day so far this Summer was a few days back. We tried to order some box fans from our local Home Despot for curbside pickup. Their website claimed to have 70 of the model we wanted in stock, yay! We carefully placed our order, making SURE to pick curbside pickup for that day, and immediately got an email that the fans would be delivered to us July 1st. No, no, no. My husband called customer service and cancelled the order, explaining about the website claiming there were 70 fans in the store and asking if we could pick them up that day. Nope! The website was inaccurate. Fine, we don’t want the fans then, we will get them somewhere else, cancel the whole thing. That should be the end of that!

Actually, no. The day before yesterday we found this on our porch:

Oh good, here’s the giant box of fans we don’t want…

So, my husband called customer service and lets them know we cancelled this order and we need it picked back up. Despot: Oh, well we have to send you a return shipping label for that… Husband: Good, send us the return label, great. ….. This morning:

???? wtf? Seriously, wtf? Why? Why are there 2 giant boxes now???

They won’t take either of these boxes back without return shipping labels, which they have to send to us, which we have to affix, and then we have to call and request they get picked up and taken away. The level of disorganization over at Home Despot must be incredible. How does a request for a shipping label result in a second giant box of fans? I can only assume it’s a second box of fans because we didn’t order anything else and this is clearly the last time we will ever order anything from this company. So, this is one example of how not to customer service unless they are expecting us to keep two boxes of fans for free, because I would be ok with that. LMAO.

Daily Slice of Dystopia

May you live in interesting times. That statement is allegedly a Chinese curse and I have to say that times have gotten well past “interesting.” The Covid-19 pandemic is coming under control in many places but it is still raging across the US. A few states seem to currently be experiencing less new case but others are seeing rates skyrocket. Things are supposedly getting better in my state so the governor is saying certain places can open up in certain ways but these phases of reopening are much too short. We aren’t giving each phase enough time to see the actual impact on number of cases before starting the next phase. I think we are headed for disaster. We may get there more slowly than some places, but disaster is the destination.

I have 3 grown children living at home unable to go out and look for jobs because of the risk of exposure to the virus. They are all on the Autism spectrum and the older 2 have always had trouble finding work, my middle child has literally never been employed except for work-study at the local community college, the oldest has been hired in restaurant and by a pharmacy chain in the past. At this point neither has worked since March. I came up with an idea so they could do some work over the summer that would save us money and gain them a useful skill: they can scrape and paint our house, or at least most of it. They are going to watch youtube videos to learn how and start at the back of the house for practice. We’ll get all the supplies, of course, and pay them a small stipend because it just wouldn’t be at all fair otherwise. I’m hoping that learning the skills and having the experience will give them both a boost in the confidence dept. and that having an income of some sort again will lift their spirits. It would be epic if either of them could go on to get work as a house painter. Anyway, that’s my scheme for the girls.

Our son has had a short gig as a paid intern for a few weeks the last 2 summers that has been amazing for him. My husband had been asking for an intern to take care of the returned student laptops each Spring. It is low-level work that includes physical cleaning, sticker removal, etc, checking them in, sorting out and shipping the ones that need to be repaired, and cleaning them out of all user information. It’s something that can be learned with maybe an hour of training and not something the Director of IT should be doing, especially when his workload is through the roof. So 2 years ago his immediate boss was suddenly on board and suggested our son could do it as he had just turned 16 and wouldn’t it be a cool experience for him? Heck, yeah! Our lad enjoyed it very much and has been shockingly good at not spending the money he’s earned. Unfortunately, they are balking at hiring anyone to do it this year. It’s insane, my husband is drowning in work, his assistant is drowning in work, and the internship is minimum wage. Further, we have all the stuff here already and having the lad do the work keeps us safe as much as is possible. Hopefully they will decide to let the kid do the work.

Meanwhile, I am back to work, and my husband is basically being told that he will have to work on campus when they reopen in the Fall. That right there is assuming a lot. It’s assumes we won’t be back in lockdown by the Fall, that there won’t be massive travel restrictions to and from the US, etc etc. It sucks that they are asking to come back to campus. He is seriously at risk for the virus, it is an international school, and he has proven conclusively that over 90% of his job can be handled remotely… except during certain brief spans of time that require him to accept of return physical objects on a frequent basis. I am furious that they told him “even if there were positive cases of Covid-19 on campus” he “should definitely still be on campus.” It is lovely that have agreed to go ahead and install all the protections he has asked for in his office, and agreed to all the procedures he has insisted on for no direct contact with staff or students, but then they tell him he will still have to go to offices and classrooms to fix projectors, printers, and other things. !!! So, he’s protected in his office (which is right by a direct entry/exit point to outside) but then he’s supposed to just walk through halls to rooms with staff and students in them? What sense does that make??? He suggested they hire a temporary IT intern to handle these things because they are very low-level anyway and he will be going nuts in the Fall trying to finish the database conversion on top of all the usual stuff (WAY too much stuff) he has to do. They suggested they could buy him a HAZMAT suit. Utter insanity.

Everyone is tired of the restrictions, everyone is tired of face masks, handwashing, social distancing, and all of it. It sucks. But is all very necessary to try to stop what is shaping up to be a horrifying tidal wave of horrific illness and utterly miserable Death. Everywhere I go I see people without masks, not that I am out and about, I’m talking about driving to work, the drive thru at the pharmacy, dropping off our household trash, and gassing the car. There are way too many people not taking this seriously. And my state is one of the better ones for this sort of thing! We are going to see number of infections rising in the next few weeks and I am going to stay home again no matter what the governor recommends even if it means I lose my job. I am not bringing this damned thing home.

Dystopia is here. This is where we are. We have a virus on the rampage and even though we are tired, bored and completely over it, the virus isn’t. It is not tired at all and it is spreading at every chance it gets. Even people with very mild cases of it are at risk for some extreme complications for a long time after the infection has faded. This thing is no joke and if you think herd immunity is some kind of answer I suggest you research the ‘black death,’ the Bubonic Plague that ravaged Europe all those centuries ago, that is what herd immunity looks like. Relying on herd immunity without a vaccine is UGLY and it reflects the utter and abject failure of the leadership of this nation to protect its citizens. They knew for months this was coming and did nothing. Now they are literally asking and expecting the American people to die for their mistakes to save the economy, to make economic numbers look better so the monster in chief can get re-elected. It’s all a fucking game to him and to his ultra-rich cronies and they view the rest of us as disposable pawns.

Not Digging Phasing Back to “Normal”

We’re easing back into the work routine, it’s going fairly well, despite one abusive patron already, during my second shift back. Keep it on the road lady, I haven’t used the system or tried to locate a book or dvd in months! Oof. I have caught up with making all the flyers I need to and am working on assembling materials for the take-home crafts, and packets of information for the contests I’ll be running and things like that. I’m learning all the new protocols, all the new procedures, etc, even as we wait to phase most of it out whenever that happens. I’m enjoying being back in the building, being among the books, getting to casually chat with a coworker, even at a distance and through our masks. I’ve got my new materials budget starting next month, it’s been slashed, but I will make do. I’ll hunt for what bargains there are to be had, solicit more donations of gently used books, etc. That’s all good. And yet I am still contemplating quitting my dream job.

I get stressed out having to go there, stressed by the extra steps we need to go through to track curbside pick up, stressed trying to talk on a phone through a mask, while the phone slips against the mask as I try to use the computer, stressed by all the cleaning, the cleaners make my skin peel, the gloves make my hands wildly sweaty and uncomfortable, I’m just very stressed by work right now and by the pace at which people are rushing to “get back to normal” without adequate time between steps to see what impact the lifting of restrictions will have on virus spread. They are just going to create a new surge of this horrible virus and we are all going to be forced to quarantine again. 😦

Stress is a big factor in my negative feelings toward working, but it isn’t the only factor. I got used to a new, softer rhythm of life, I have been able to be a better wife, better mother, better pet-mom, vastly more prolific artist, and despite all the stress of the pandemic a generally happier person in a bunch of ways. I had more time to read, more time to learn new things, I liked it. Normalcy kind of sucks. Being stressed, rushing places, having to plan dinner for my family and a stupid, sad separate dinner for myself. (usually a couple of granola bars and some water for me. bleh) Not working allowed me to reach out, online of course, and keep up with my friends more, connect in new, untried ways that have turned out to be hella cool. I feel more of a sense of community with all my friends than I did when we were all rushing out to jobs all the time, driving kids around, constantly running errands and busy, busy, busy! Not that I was idle at home, I mean now I am cause it’s a billion degrees out, but I was painting, writing, working from home, cooking a lot, reading, planning, dreaming, just living. And it was good.

We’ve been lucky, we’ve been able to continue to work from home through this nightmare, we have been getting paid when others have been laid off temporarily or permanently, lost their insurance and suffered hunger while not being able to pay their bills. We have friends who are struggling through this and it’s just so stressful. We help where we can but I wish we could do more. I want to fix all the problems and it sucks that I can’t, that I have to choose where I feel like we can make the best impact at any given time. When the virus comes roaring back and we are all forced to go back home I think it might be worse the second time around. Folks that lost jobs will probably still be out of work and how are they supposed to eat and live if our damn government doesn’t support its citizens? Doesn’t ban evictions and suspend the machinery of rent and mortgage collection and tell the greedy utilities they aren’t allowed to shut people off? If our government was more functional we would have universal health care, a strong safety net, and much else that the rest of the civilized world already has. We need to fix that!

Goals for a Renewed Earth

I am not a fan of all this heat, it is horrible, I wish I could live somewhere cooler and more pleasant. I do love a lot about where I’m planted though. It’s beautiful here though I’d like to live wilder. We get a fair amount of wildlife, have a bunch of wild edibles growing in the yard, have some room to garden in if I can ever overcome my lack of skill in that area. I got mint established after 3 years of trying. Don’t laugh! Ok, you can laugh, I suck at gardening, I know it. I have a wild mint that won’t fill the area I gave it but is branching out, finally! I thought it was supposed to take over? I am at the point I can manage not to kill it.

We need some rain too, please, when mint is wilting in the shade it is well past time for some RAIN. I keep having to water the “chocolate mint” in the front yard because it is just suffering. It gets too much sun I think. Didn’t know mint wanted some shade when I put it there. It is spreading a bit though so there might be enough to harvest for tea! The wild blackberries are looking like they will be abundant this year, if we get some rain for them, gods, I want blackberries! I also have some golden raspberry plants my son and I put in that are doing better than you’d think seeing as I’ve been looking after them. Maybe 4 years ago (?) we bought a little plant and put it in the yard, it put out about 7 berries and then winter came and it was gone, I thought it was dead, done, finished, but it came back up! So in late fall I buried the little plant in leaves and put some cloth over it held in place with a few rocks I think. Uncovered it in the spring and it grew bigger that year, gave us some more berries, not many. So I’ve been finding ways to sort of insulate it in the winter since then and it seems to work! It’s spread a bit, sent out its little runners, and it’s a real bush now. I hope we’ll get berries in an amount I can maybe brag a little about. “Yep, a whole pint. I’m a farmer now, one with the land…”

I want to grow my own food! My actual goals are:

To keep encouraging, while somewhat containing, the wild edibles in my yard (like the blackberries!)
Bolstering the mint until it becomes a problem and then I’ll weed it around its edges
Keep the roses productive
Get the golden raspberries established into a berry patch that produces usable quantities
Raised beds, or maybe even mounds, for veggies and such
Lots of productive veggie plants in the raised beds (squashes, onions, potatoes, beans, garlic etc)
A real, awesome herb garden
A little orchard: an apple tree, pear tree, maybe a persimmon tree
a pepper tree!
Maybe some chickens because I love them, and eggs are nice, and chickens eat ticks
Maybe ducks? So, also a little pond for them, they are cute and hilarious, and they eat slugs
Some pretty serious fencing or hedges for privacy mostly
Cold frames too, to extend the growing season!
Maybe a small greenhouse
If I get all that there won’t be any lawn so, yay! no lawn, another thing I want

I just want my little paradise where I can harvest some food and eat it super fresh. I want food I grow myself, that I can preserve and use in the winter. That would make me smile.

Wow. Kids These Days.

I’m a teen librarian because I love teens and I feel like they get, and have always gotten, such a bad deal. They get blamed for causing trouble, being idle, hanging out in public, being lazy, etc. If they are in public people are upset that they take over a booth in a restaurant but don’t buy enough, or are too loud or troublesome. If they stay home and play video games they get blamed for being lazy or addicted to the games. I feel like they get judged all the time and have no place to BE. They tend not to have much money so there’s not much to do in public that they can afford. It’s an absolute tragedy that we have commodified every public space, activity, and everything about life. In a non-pandemicky world there is still the library. Public libraries are one of few spaces people can go and just BE and aren’t expected to spend any money. I like being a teen librarian because I am curating and overseeing books they can read, computers they can use, space they can just spend time in. I also get to come up with programming, free programming they can take part in.

Yeah, so I appreciate teenagers, maybe more than most, and I super hate how boomers seem to feel about all the generations under them and their especial disdain for Millenials who are pretty awesome and got a super shitty deal. And now we have Gen-Z, and they are clever, and quirky, and feel like something altogether new. I can’t imagine growing up as they have in a world on the brink of obvious ecological disaster and spreading fascism. Do we wonder that their humor is nihilistic? They look at the world and they see what is… and they have to deal with it as children. But look what they can do: Teens and early 20-somethings registered in Droves for the rally in Tulsa OK under, apparently, raunchy fake names and such. The campaign of hate and willful disease spreading thought they had a million people showing up and they got less than 7,000 because a bunch of tech-saavy kids punked them, hard. We ought to be sending massive quantities of burn ointment to the white house, seriously, send in the trauma docs. Savage. Brilliant.

“And these children that you spit on
As they try to change their worlds
Are immune to your consultations
They’re quite aware of what they’re going through”

And they are amazing, wonderful, and fierce as hell. May the gods old and new bless these clever, brave, and noble kids.

Saturday Morning in Our Dystopia

The temperature is slated to be in the upper 80s for the next… forever. I don’t deal well with the heat these past several years. It’s still jarring and crazy-making to me because I used to be cold all the time and I liked it. It was almost like I was always in air-conditioning and because of it I could appreciate immediate heat sources very much. I could still enjoy a nice cold dip in a body of water, enjoyed swimming and going outside in the cold, and so on, and I could soak in the heat from the sun or a crackling fire and purr like a cat. I knew I had it good. Now I just suffer the heat and hate it. I mean, the past year or so, I feel a little better than I did, and I have hope that maybe I can feel good again, cold again, but suffice it to say; heatwaves are my kryptonite. I become weak, and miserable, and nearly inert. UGH. And with the pandemic you know I’m not running off anywhere to try and swim.

But life isn’t all bad. I’m running my game tonight with at least half the players so we’ll see if they survive. LOL. 2nd edition modules are quite brutal. I’m honestly mystified as to how the players are supposed to survive certain encounters. Optimally designed characters, with an exquisite sense of strategy… maybe, but some of my players have not designed their characters along lines that would tend to maximize their potential. It may not cause issues in the short-term but a little ways down the road there is potential for some pretty big problems, character deaths, mainly. It sucks, but there is only so much nerfing a GM can do and still retain plausibility, still allow players to feel like the world makes sense, and that it has cohesion. Meh, we’ll see how it goes I guess. Hopefully adjustments will be made as the players start to realize that they can play their characters any way they want to but that their stats and abilities have to be chosen with combat in mind when playing in a module/adventure path. My home brew games are different, they are always heavy on the plot and roleplay, we are telling a story together and it is amazing, but I don’t have the mental energy to build all that right now. So here we are.

I can’t deal with reality right now so I’m escaping into books, art, and games. It’s all too much. I’m trying to keep up with the news and lend my support to excellent causes but I’m exhausted, stressed, almost ill. I’m trying to find some kind of balance, enough news to know what’s going on but not so much that I want to hide in an underground bunker. Reality is so rough lately. I have seen spots of good news here and there though, and that’s cheering. I mean, we’re all going to like die of the pandemic because a bunch of people think wearing masks is like being handcuffed or something, but besides that it seems like there are positive changes on the brink of happening. We could have non-militarized police soon, who stop murdering people of color, we might see some freaking reparations for slavery and actual racial and economic equity happening. Canada might invade the US and bring democracy to it’s blighted political landscape, who knows? (It could happen, let me dream!)

Stay well, stay safe! Drink some water and get some rest. Take care of you, because no one else is going to.

Blogging for Sanity

I can’t believe what I am seeing in the world, in my country, in my neighborhood. We’ve got a global pandemic of a disease that is just a shocking nightmare, millions, upon millions of people out of work with no income and no health insurance, no freaking FOOD, and since the safety net’s been gutted there is almost nothing there to catch them. Food banks are screaming, crying, and begging for help to try and meet the need to keep families from starving to death in the richest country in the history of the planet… while billionaires are having to find extra help so they count all the profit they’ve made while hundreds of thousands of Americans die. Aside from not having the money for food, people can’t pay their rent/mortgage, they can’t pay their electric bills, or their car insurance, and the list goes on.

Some of these threats are more immediate than others, deadly disease and hunger/malnutrition are clearly top threats, but if you lose your home how TF are you supposed to protect yourself from the virus? We are all sick and tired of being shut up at home. I want to go out to a nice meal I didn’t cook and don’t have to clean up after, I want my kid to get their blood-work done, I want us all to see the dentist, we were supposed to go in April, I want to be able to go swimming, to have the kids come into the library for programs, etc, etc. But the virus is NOT tired, the virus is fine, it is out there feeling energetic and virulent, eager to infect everyone. It is a perfect storm of a virus:

Highly Infectious
Long Incubation
Asymptomatic Transmission
Horribly Miserable for those who get a “bad case” of it
Multiple, awful issues connected to it like multiple organ failure, severe clotting, etc.
Having “Recovered” may still mean you need a lung transplant even if you were healthy before you got it, dying of a heart attack even if you were healthy before, dying just when it looked like you were about to recover. Most of these can happen even to people with mild or NO symptoms.

But somehow a whole bunch of people have decided they are just “over” this whole virus kerfuffle and are just going to traipse back out to have their hair and nails done, get massages, eat at restaurants, go to bars, go to parties, etc, etc. I 100% get the people who are desperate to get back to work because they have bills they can’t pay or are facing hunger, they are weighing the risk of disease against eating, having shelter and water, medication, etc. They are not being stupid they are desperate. They shouldn’t be in that position. Our government should have responded to the threat of this pandemic sooner and provided clear, medicine and science-based leadership. Yes it would have been nice if China had been more honest and not downplayed the threat but if I, a geekly housewife/part-time teen librarian and mom, could hear the news coming out of China and see the videos of workers in hazmat suits spraying the streets down and know that it wasn’t adding up. If I, with my limited information, and limited resources could see the threat coming and start preparing in January, which I did, I think our government could have, and bloody well should have, seen it coming and fricking prepared.

They are giving away tax cuts to BILLIONAIRES while Americans go hungry, WTF? They should be taxing the wealthy more so they can support everyday people who need money to pay for food and rent so our country can freaking SURVIVE this crisis. They could and should be pushing through a completely socialized medical system Right Now, covering everything. They are LYING when they say it would be too expensive, the prices we, as Americans pay for health services and medicines are inflated often by orders of magnitude. That’s part of the deal of single-payer health care, the government helps set the prices of everything. That’s why ambulance rides all over Europe cost an average of $30-50 while we pay upwards of $2,000 for the exact same thing.

But instead of doing anything sane like all of that, they have decided that instead of dealing with the situation, instead of protecting the American population, they are just going to send everyone back out there and hope not too many people die. But that is a lie. How can they pretend to care how many people die while actively inflaming their extremist supporters not to wear masks? While claiming the news, and scientists, and liberals are hyping the whole thing up just hurt the President? While the President and his cronies wander around without masks on? Holding big rallies with no social distancing? It seems like they don’t care at all if it spreads, or if millions die. What do they care about? Money. Money for them, money for billionaires, more and more and more money while people are dying. And people of color are dying at a higher rate while police seem to kill them in broad daylight without consequences. And Native Americans are dying too. I have heard the infection rates on reservations are appalling. How can this be 2020 if Black Lives Matter is a controversial statement?

And yet, here we go, pushing everything to go back to normal so infection rates can rise and spike and our hospitals can be overwhelmed and we can experience a truly nightmarish situation. I am back to work now, in a closed building, with a million precautions in place. I am lucky, lucky, lucky that my boss, and the trustees, and the town are taking this virus so seriously, and yet I am still terrified because getting this virus is not an option. I cannot bring this thing home to my family, to my severely asthmatic husband, to my daughter with damage to her heart. I am still considering quitting my dream job because once the doors open at all we can say patrons have to wear masks all we want but how are we supposed to enforce it? I wish everyone would just show compassion for others and wear the damn masks. I hope that right now we are changing the world and ending the extreme racial inequity in the United States and around the world. I hope that we can fix things. I hope my country can survive this time of multiple, horrible disasters. I’m not exactly sure what the alternative looks like but I know it’s something I do not want to see.

The Meh, the Good, & the Work to be Done

My first day back at work was demoralizing. I don’t remember how to do anything and there are new procedures for EVERYTHING. I feel like an idiot. Checking items back in now has so many steps and I’m not even talking about the quarantining and cleaning. Since there is no interlibrary loaning going on now we have to check in each item, cancel any transits that come up, turn on check in modifiers and re-check-in. Then we need to turn off the check in modifiers and scan the next item. It really slows things down. We are also not even half-way through with the deep cleaning of the entire library and need to keep up with that. We are each supposed to complete one task from the list per shift so I cleaned the staff freezer last night. We have a whole new list of procedures for curbside pick-up that includes a spreadsheet that confuses the heck out of me and delivery as well. Last night was a lot and I felt overwhelmed. I love this job, I love this job, I love this job. I also have real concerns about when the doors open and being exposed to the virus that sometimes necessitates lung transplants in formerly healthy people. #wanttostayhome

In better news apparently the U.S. Supreme Court opted to protect LGBTQ workers from being fired for being themselves. YAY! That is awesome. I mean, so much more work to be done to create a truly free and equal society for all people, but it’s good to see some decent decisions being made these days. I am also really heartened by seeing the turn-out for Black Lives Matter and Black Trans Lives Matter rallies. We need to keep this going and make real change happen. We need to fix everything that’s broken and make things truly great for all of us.

I’m trying to sort through my own programming/attitudes/beliefs/etc, and learn how to become a real ally for all marginalized people right now. It’s a little overwhelming when I think of it that way, actually, so I’m trying to figure out one step, then a next step, learning how to listen, how to put my feelings in their place so I can keep listening when things get uncomfortable. Right now I’m mostly doing a lot of reading and watching videos and things. I know I will make mistakes I’d just prefer not to storm out there like some giant water buffalo making every mistake.

We all need to do whatever we can to support justice and equality for all. I thought I understood how bad things were for Black Americans but I am finding out that what I know was a fraction of what has been going on. I’m sure I don’t even have the full picture yet, may never be able to fully comprehend how entrenched, institutionalized racism impacts and has been impacting non-white communities, even so I can learn to help, to work for a better world, a just world where people are all treated fairly and with actual human respect.

104 days of isolation. I’m not ready to go back.

20,000 new cases in the U.S. every day… again, and I have to start back to work today. I am an animal undergoing stress. We have been so careful and have been waiting this out as best we can and now I am supposed to go back to work and raise our risk of exposure when it isn’t safe at all. I’ll be in the library with one coworker, always the same coworker for every shift, with lots of protocols and precautions in place. It’s good, it’ll be fine, it’s ok. No patrons will be allowed in but we are supposed to manage curbside pick-up for people. It’ll be ok.

I’m freaked out mostly because I see so many people out there without masks. They walk up and down my street in groups, they jog, bicycle, and walk their dogs. People like my mother have been having “socially distanced” gatherings all along, rejected their masks because they didn’t feel like they could get enough air, and still say they have “zero exposure.” I trust almost no one who assures me they haven’t been exposed. People are just way too casual about this virus and believe, without actual proof, way too many things about it. Much of my husband’s family just believes that Vitamin D will keep them from getting it, tons of people are assuming it will die down in the summer and are behaving accordingly. I’m not saying they are wrong I am saying we don’t know so we should not rush out there and risk being filled with regret.

In all seriousness I do not think there is an upper limit to the number of times I am going to have to answer the same damn questions for my mother. “Is hubby back to work yet?” Answer: No. He will not consider going back until September. “Are the kids getting out to see their friends or looking for jobs?” Answer: No. They will not consider doing so until at least September. I also hear about (from my mother) everything everyone else is comfortable doing now. Mom sees her friends “with social distance,” my sister had her in-laws over, this or that place is open for business, her friend did X, Y, or Z. Well, they can all go ahead and do that, that is up to them, that is what they are doing, I will do what I feel is wise. Does she think I am going suddenly say; “oh so-and-so is doing that? Sign me up! That changes Everything!” I get exhausted dealing with her for over 10 minutes these days.

So, I am going back to work today. Stressed, with a headache, but, and I am dead serious about this, without a bra. I cannot begin to express how awesome it is to have gone 3 MONTHS without wearing one of those torture devices and I am not going back. I will find a way. Masks are uncomfortable but at least they serve to help protect me from an actual threat, I will wear a mask without complaint. Let me add that I totally get that some women like bras, I assume, or need them because they serve an actual function for them. To quote a badass babe; “That’s not me.” My boobs are not of sufficient magnitude to warrant outside support. That said, I think I need to find some sort of substitute to hide certain, mercurial little aspects of said boobs, but I am determined to get that sorted.

Belatedly I am realizing that there are a number of logistical problems I need to sort out before I can go to work today: (yes, I am sitting here blogging instead of jumping on those problems)

I need an outfit I can decently wear without a bra that isn’t basically pajamas.
I need to make or figure out something for dinner that someone else can make without too much risk-factor.
I need to figure out some sort of dinner for myself that I can bring to work.
I have to remember/figure out all the things I need to bring with me to work so I can get stuff done once I get there.
I have to hope I can still drive in the dark.
I forgot to call and get my car looked at for what is hopefully a muffler problem and
I need to get my oil changed.

Usually making lists calms me down. This one is not helping.