notes from day one of wfh

march 18, 2020

it hasn't been a difficult adjustment for me, self-quarantining. I have plenty of experience avoiding being out in public, and limiting my contact with people. I also have lots of experience washing my hands, though I have had to be sure to wash them long enough lately. I've been good about not obsessively washing, and that's good.

there are plenty of things to keep me occupied at home. and I have rarely complained of not having something to do. and with still being able to go outside, it isn't as though I have cabin fever. what has been more difficult is getting my family to follow recommendations. but now that my mom is worried about being exposed to my niece, who was still working when someone in her checkout line announced they had been tested at GCH (assuming the test was negative, but still--how many others haven't been tested since we can only get approval for that with certain symptoms?). so hopefully her worry will remind her to stay home. and I know we'll all check on each other with regard to making sure everyone has what they need.

Fast Forward a year and almost 8 months...It's November 9, 2021, and we are still in a pandemic. So much has happened since this original entry. I quit my job because the people who bought the insurance brokerage were horrible, and thought the pandemic was a hoax, the response unreasonable. They used an industrial-grade cleaner but did not enforce any of the other health and safety protocols. I discussed quitting with Noah, and he understood my needing to. I was unemployed for 4 months, and then Grace was my savior, offering for me to interview with her company, who was looking to hire someone part time. So I went from working as a secretary to working in customer support. I've had customer-oriented jobs before, but this one was completely remote. As in the company that hired me has always operated remotely, with teams of people in a couple locations (Boise, Idaho and also Iceland, where 2 of the founders live). I can't quite express how wonderful it is to work from home. Doing so also fueled my idea for creating a nonprofit business to utilize my counseling skills on my own terms. But back to the pandemic and how it's affected me. 

It's still challenging when people have a different way of operating than I do. Challenging not to judge. Challenging not to blame folks who have no regard for safety protocols, because they are the reason we're still dealing with this pandemic to the degree that we are. But within my family, things are...well, also not so straightforward. Grace has 3 children with no help outside the family. If she weren't able to send them to daycare and school, quite frankly, she may have killed herself. Them being able to go someplace else for a chunk of the weekdays is what has made it possible for her to work, and maintain some semblance of sanity. She cannot concern herself with the risk that exists in sending her children to be around other children, where mask policies may or may not be enforced, where other families may or may not believe in the threat of this virus. My mom is dating a guy. And this means that she's been going on lots of dates. To places that do not enforce a strict mask policy. So I worry, but I kept encouraging her to get her booster shot, and now she has. My youngest sister, like me, is content to be home. She has traveled a couple time to other states for events, but has done the responsible thing and quarantined for 2 weeks after returning. She is vaccinated. She wears her mask in public spaces when she does go out. I don't know how her friends are living, and I know she has a pod of friends whom she still sees regularly. 

When we meet at Grace's for family gatherings, I am the only one who wears a mask indoors. And it's mostly because of the children, but also because I don't know how everyone is living, and I simply don't feel the risk is worth it. If a little piece of cloth can help protect me and Noah from getting Covid, the long-term effects of which we still don't fully understand, then to me it is more than worth it to be safe rather than sorry.

I can't control how other people behave. I can't control the people who are too stupid to take small steps to be safer. I can control how my anger comes out. I can control how I behave. I can control the places I go and the people I spend my time with (which is true in most cases, but even more so now that I work from home). 

The hardest thing to adjust to living at home is creating an equal number of opportunities for movement where old jobs did it for me. Because I work from home now, I am more sedentary. I clean. I do chores and things around the house that involve movement, but it is still less, and so I have gained Covid weight. I am not going to beat myself up over this. It is something I'm aware of, and something I am still trying to figure out how to manage, but it's also not as important to me as not contributing to the spread of a virus that we do not fully understand. People like my coworker talk about "living their lives." As if a mask prevents one from being able to socialize. I am proud of the ways I have continued to live my life. I have not gone out of my way to defy the health and safety suggestions or mandates that exist. I have been able to reconnect with people I didn't speak with as frequently thanks to wonderful technology and video chats. I have not stopped living, and the implication that I have is just...stupid. 

So I do worry about my family, but I know that it doesn't do me any good to dwell on it, and I know that they are allowed to make their own choices, and that their choices may be limited or affected by their mental health needs, which they know best. 

I try not to be too judgmental, but I also do reserve the right to privately shake my head at anyone who has insisted on putting the most at risk at risk during a fucking pandemic. And I think I get upset about the people I know who are travelling all over the place, because it signals to the people who have been careless the whole time that their behaviors are fine. And they're not. My coworker, who refuses to get vaccinated, should not be okay with travelling around the contiguous United States. Thank god she isn't worldly enough to travel elsewhere. 

Time for my shift. Man, I love working from home!