Quarantine Diary: Could Be Worse

Today marks 21 days since we started social distancing, quarantine, and being home.

While yesterday the schools were pronounced closed until the next school year, today we move forward. Yesterday I listened to music and cried. I was folding laundry, and the weight of reality hit me hard. I just cried. It is like the rug is pulled out from under me over and over.

Today, however, is cause for celebration. My son turns five, we’ll see family (from a distance) that we haven’t seen in weeks, and we’ll let the weather remind us that not everyday is dark and dreary.

I mean, we could be hospitalized. We could be on the brink of death. Instead, we aren’t. Instead we are stuck in limbo, like Groundhog Day the movie. It often feels like the same day over and over. Sometimes, rarely, it doesn’t.

The benefits of this are that I’m writing daily. I’m on Facebook more (not truly my favorite benefit, but I’m still calling it one). My kids are together. I get to hug them anytime I want. I can breathe. I see the sun for what it is: warmth and solace. When we laugh, we laugh harder than we ever have. When we feel silly, we get sillier than we were before. We lean hard into the things we used to never have time for. We embrace the simplest of joys.

What a privilege to say it could be worse. Some days I feel like I’m just waiting for the virus to be in our house. Other days I forget about it for a bit. Today I get to celebrate the life of my son. Every so often I remember the kindness it is to live at all.

It all could change at a moment’s notice, but for this moment, it isn’t. I relish in the consistently bored parts of quarantine, remembering that it means it isn’t worse for us when it could be. That is a kindness.

What a kindness it is to live.