Resignation

Also, it snowed this weekend.  It's May, if you've lost track.

When COVID-19 shut everything down, I railed against it.  During the initial two weeks of closure, I colored the days black on our home-calendar, and used every glittery poop emoji sticker in my daughter's Justice sticker collection, to illustrate our feelings about the two-week shut-down.  There were also bio-hazard stickers in that collection.  We stuck those to the calendar, too, for the days of March 16- March 27th. 

It felt like the walls were closing in with the sudden stoppage of routine, of Zoe being ripped from in-person school, and my husband being told he couldn't practice dentistry.  I wondered if we'd all kill each other by the end of those first two weeks. 

I was still feeling the Hate as the second round of Kick-the-Closure-Can was announced.  We'd be down until April 9th.  But Zoe and I sat down and colored those closed-school days in rainbow, added glitter stickers.  We made the days look festive.  We figured we might as well hold onto Hope.  April 9th was supposed to be a half-day of school.  It was the Thursday before Easter.  That wouldn't be so bad.  Ease back into it with a half-day, then a weekend. 

You know the rest.  You're living it, too.  Everything shut down, indefinitely. 

You've been walking this Journey Through the Emotional Jungle right along with me, Friends.  I've had my good days where I can be chipper and try to buoy everyone up.  I've had my days where I've been wishing for a comet to swing by, so I could grab its tail and swing on off this planet.  I've had a lot of in-between days, where I'm just glad to exist to see the next day.  I've had days that I've felt almost normal.  I've spent swaths of days in the Dark, letting the mean-girl voices in my own head hurt my feelings.  I've had days where I've been Very Angry, felt Rage building up in my core like lava.

I think we're all experiencing some version of the same emotional loop, Friends.  Hopefully, maybe thank goodness we're not all on Very Angry on the same day.  Hopefully some of us can be Fairly Chipper on some days, to balance out the Dark, Twisty, Very Angry. 

On Friday, the Podunk Portion of PA went on Yellow Status.  Our Governor is adorable in his efforts to color-code a situation like your pal AprilBee.  He has neither the panache nor the whimsy nor the balls to give Pennsylvanians a true Color-Coded Situation experience the way I could.  But that's a rant for another time.  We have Red, Yella, and Green.  Red was the Utter Lockdown.  Yellow is Lockdown Lite, and Green is All Bets Are Off.  And I am sure like me, you're noticing some room for some nuance, and the addition of a few more colors in this plan. 

Without crying too much about our specific Blues, even though we were told the dentist's office can open back up, the wording in the lack of guideline hamstrings us almost as much as or more as the "Emergencies Only" order we've been operating under for the last couple months.  The Yellow Light opens up so many cans of worms, so many unwinnable situations. 

Don't misunderstand me.  I'm sitting here, boiling, thinking about all of this.  I'm overwhelmed and paralyzed, trying to come up with helpful suggestions for my husband, who's shouldering this on his own.  We just need more information.  There's so much at stake, reopening, and we don't know what's what.  We just need more information. 

So for the next couple weeks, at least, we're still pacing the floor and living under the same parameters as we did when we were in the Red Phase.

Red and Resigned.  That's how I feel overall, mostly.  Just like in traffic, the yellow lockdown light is awkward.  Do we stay or do we go?  Speed up to try to beat the red or jam on the brakes?  There are risks and rewards to both, but the rewards don't feel very rewardy right now.  So we're opting for More of the Same until we have further information.  And I'm just resigned to that.  Resigned.  This is what it is.  No sense struggling against it.

If you're also in a ho-hum mood this Monday, and wondering if you're experiencing "Resignation," you're not alone.  Just thought you should know.