According to my friend who is quarantined in Arlington, VA, it's been over a week now that we've sequestered ourselves in our dwellings and began hoarding toilet paper. Everyone except my family, because we needed to shop on Friday like normal, so we put buying TP off until then, and couldn't find any for a week. My Arlington friend is definitely more extroverted than I am; the only change to my routine is that I don't have to go to work at my GA job; I'm focused on what were already online classes.
Fine people, some of you are not in education. Some of you take vacations this time of year because 'rates are lower', or in the fall after tourist season, or whenever you bloody well please because your vacay time doesn't have to occur within a mandatory window of June, July, and August. With the exception of the one time I went to England in 2008, have not been captain of my own destiny enough to afford to go on a vacation anywhere other than my parent's house. Or the yearly encampments at Old Fort Niagara and Cook's Forest. Not exactly exotic, and always when I already have time off from school. This whole staycation taking place not over a holiday and not in the middle of summer is a revelation.
Holiday vacation is not a vacation. At least if you're the person partly responsible for making holiday festivities happen. It's a time and a half job. Holiday vacations aren't nice. This? Holy cow. THIS IS SO NICE. I HAVE A RESPONSIBILITY TO NO ONE TO MEET HOLIDAY EXPECTATIONS.
I sort of actually like being outdoors this time of year. Keep your sunscreen, beaches, relative humidity of 99%, and skin cancer. Right now, the outside temperatures are all over the place, 60 and sunny one day, 26 with a wind chill of 15 the next. Welcome to spring in my neck of the woods. But the world is coming alive out there. Our crocuses poked their heads up and have been nodding in the brisk breeze. Buds are preparing to burst on branches; the quince, the sassafras, the flowering almond, those weird bushes on the side of the house that we've never been able to properly identify. On alternate route home from picking up flea medication for the pets, my mother and I saw pussy willows. There's been nothing to stop anyone currently from sitting outside in their yard except the wind chill, which I fully plan to do, with a roaring fire in the brazier. I bought the thing, I may as well get some use out of it if events are going to continue to be canceled.
While I do have to stay on top of coursework, I have no intention of keeping myself parked in front of a computer terminal just so everything can be turned in ahead of time (though this isn't a terrible idea...) Because of the nature of my GA, I haven't had a proper break, even over Christmas, because we have to come in and work a high vigilance job anyway. And now we don't. Frankly, it's a relief. I don't feel like I'm vibrating or mentally numb anymore. When this whole thing was beginning to blow up, we were told that face-to-face classes would resume April 6th. Now face to face University and ecumenical activities have been canceled indefinitely. I'm okay with this.
