Right, surely we don’t need another COVID thread but this one I am going to hope is graced with the fact that we are making some progress and “help is on the way”.
I’ve been reading about “the moment”. The specific moment or day or event about a year ago when you realized this virus was a big deal and/or your world/home was changing. When the virus became took up daily space in your mind, changes happened in your daily routine - whatever your “moment” was.
And if possible, end your thoughts with a positive or “moving forward” update. Abasket always tries to keep the glass half full.
For me, “the moment” came in my office at work around mid-March. I did not tune in or jump on board the very early toilet paper runs, stocking up of items, etc. Sort of regretfully. I think I refused to give mind space to this terrible trend.
I came to work on a Monday after a weekend where I DID realize something terrible was happening. I remember thinking “why am I going to my office? Why have we not been given instructions to plan something different for work? WHY have I not bought a single extra item or roll of TP?!” At work I felt so uneasy and I mentioned it to a work friend who expressed my feelings to our chairman who was relatively new. I remember him coming to my office door and saying nicely “why are you here abasket? Can you do your work from home? I think you can so you should pack up enough for the next two weeks (haha) and plan to work from home. That is the safe thing to do”.
I finished out the day because I wanted to gather up files and such to be able to make it through a couple of weeks. A week or two later another moment was my grad school daughter, now on virtual classes deciding to come home for a period of time. I remember us actually worrying about if it was ok for her to travel the 2.5 hours home because the “stay at home” mandate seemed so very serious, like would they stop her on the road traveling?!
Positive update:
We have been back to the office part time since July with increasing office time since the vaccine was released and full office time expected by first of June. (working on a hospital campus and all our department is vaccinated).
I don’t have an exact “moment” for me. I was much more aware of the likely severity than dh was, primarily because of what I was reading on here. However, for my dh it was definitely when they immediately ceased the NCAA basketball tournament. That got his attention. EDIT: Maybe it was the SEC basketball tournament??
I don’t necessarily have a specific positive update. I don’t work so have nothing on that front to report upon. Dh took started a job on May 1. They worked from home until January 1, but that was only because their office building was being completely remodeled. He works for a small start-up, and there are only three employees.
My generic positive update is I feel like we are starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel. Mil is two weeks past her second vaccine and is thrilled to be resuming her social life with others who are similar. Originally I felt like it might be July or August before we were eligible, but recent developments make me hopeful for May.
H and I had just returned from Georgia. We had done a final cleanup of his parents’ house because they had moved into assisted living & they put the house on the market while we were there. The house sold that day, his parents’ AL facility went into lockdown, and our Governor held a press conference. She closed schools and instructed all non essential businesses to shut down or work remotely. H and I understood the gravity of the situation that day.
On the positive side, my MIL is fully vaccinated and is happily enjoying “doing more normal things.” Hopefully, the new vaccine will allow for the rest of us to get vaccinated soon. I see a light at the end of the tunnel!
The moment was when DD’19 got the message to not return to college after the spring break + 1 week. (When she got the news that they were adding a week to spring break, we really thought it would just be one week. We’re in the Midwest, after all. These things don’t happen here )
Positive things, her sophomore year has been relatively normal and a good experience with a lot of in person activity. I feel like the peak in November for our state that has been steadily decreasing is coming down for good. The three of us in the front of the office at work have each quarantined for a family member but with fairly good timing- not too busy time, not at the same time as another. Just need to make it through tax season uneventfully.
I can’t remember exactly the moment, but I remember dropping off one of my kids at practice and talking to some friends about this “new virus”. I said I’d heard that things were predicted to get pretty bad in another week or so, but none of us could really wrap our heads around what that would look like. A week later was March 13, and everything was shut down.
Positive things: Our local schools have been able to bring kids back to school in-person with options for virtual learning too. Sports and activities are very modified but are happening. Starting today, CT is vaccinating age 55+, plus teachers and childcare providers. Near the end of March, age 45+ will be able to register for vaccinations. That’s much sooner than anticipated!
I guess there were two significant moments in our family. One was my personal realization that this was an evolving situation that wouldn’t ease in a month or so. I was supposed to travel overseas in March for a wedding but I hesitated to buy the flight ticket in mid-February, preferring to wait and watch.
Glad I did because I would’ve been stuck in a complete lockdown for 2 months. We’ve missed 3 weddings in 2020 but have the chance to go for another at the end of this year. I’m hopeful about that as our vaccine time frame is April or May.
The second, the more significant, realization for the entire family, was when one kid was stuck in Europe with all flights suddenly cancelled to the US and the other (at around the same time) having an emergency health issue in the middle of spring break vacation. Those were a stressful few days as we figured out the best way to get both of them back home.
Kid 1 is planning on using the cancelled flight funds to make a trip soon and the other is looking forward to a spring break/graduation trip sans any health issues🤞
I went to puppy kindergarten in the evening with my dog. After class was over I got into the car and Tom Hanks had tested positive and the NBA was cancelling games. My daughter’s wedding was planned for 150 people on March 28th. I was working at a state operated long term care facility that was scheduled to close on 12/31/2019, but ended up closing on 2/28/2020. We were in the middle of cleaning everything out when in late March they decided we needed to reopen as a Covid Alternate Care Surge Facility. The Covid Surge facility has opened and closed and opened and closed and opened. I am pretty sure we are going to close again this month. It was very strange to be working during the initial lockdown.
Positive things: My daughter got married in our backyard with just immediate family (with friends watching online). They bought a house, got a cat and a dog and are very happy. I play a lot of tennis. Luckily they realized that it was reasonably safe so I have been playing multiple times a week since about April. Because I was working at a healthcare facility I was able to receive the vaccine (I will receive my second shot this week).
I had two friends traveling. One left for India on Feb 29 and one to Mexico on March 1 (I was senior sitting her MIL). Before the Mexico one left, she had a cold and was tested for the flu (negative) but couldn’t get tested for covid even though she had been at a press conference with the governor (I kept saying if they wanted to test the governor, they’d test the governor, not those who had been near him). Her doctors told her to go to Mexico, not a big deal…
The one in India was bragging about how cheap inhalers were in India, kept posting pictures of her trip. Meanwhile, Trump shut down international travel (sort of) and she was scheduled to travel back through Germany. She was rerouted through San Francisco (and a CC member posted that they saw her plane land and deplane with something like 20 people in wheelchairs, all coughing and wheezing). She arrived home sick, could never get a covid test, and didn’t leave her house for 2 months.
But it was the PAC 12 basketball tournament shutting down mid-game, March Madness first cancelling fans and then the entire tournament, schools here closing March 13 (and never reopening last spring), my brother’s entire season being cancelled (a spring youth sports league) because the Parks and Rec department closed outside parks and taped off playgrounds and fields.
A rolling nightmare. And then the mask making started and continues to this day.
Definitely two events, don’t know the day but early March. Cancelling March Madness and the first college to shut down and send their kids home. I knew the dominoes would fall immediately and within a week they were all basically shutting down. I remember thinking, this is bad and is going to take a long time. Unchartered waters.
A year ago, the first weekend of March, my in laws came to visit and we went to dinner at a nice steakhouse. We talked about my bil and sil were leaving for a medical conference. My son had just had a birthday and we were looking forward to visiting him in a couple of weeks. My daughter was moving in with her boyfriend that very weekend and they were going to a business conference the next week.
The medical conference for my bil went off but that was the last conference scheduled for anyone I knew. My daughter’s timing for moving was crazy because everything pretty much shut down the next week, they never did go to that business conference or the 3 weddings they had that spring.
We didn’t visit our son. None of the great plans we talked about at that dinner ever really happened. My husband brought his computer home 2 weeks later and hasn’t left.
The next week I went from store to store buying things I needed. Toilet paper and hand sanitizer. I had a feeling of dread that whole week.
I do see a light in the horizon. The in laws and my mom have been vaccinated. The medical people in the family are all done with theirs.
We have friends in Seattle. One of our kids was planning a trip there. At this point a year ago, I was asking the kid to not take this trip. When her friends told her to not come, I knew it was serious. Two of the friends are doctors.
Everything didn’t shut down in CT until mid March. We went out to dinner the very last evening restaurants were open that month. The place was usually mobbed…and it wasn’t. Another sign things weren’t looking so good.
But even then…Almost everyone I know thought this would pass in a couple of weeks. I don’t think anyone expected us to be doing a year in review.
We live in Upstate NY so we were sensing something happening pretty early on. March 7 was D20’s orchestra concert where the music department raises money for the scholarship fund. My elderly parents were on the fence about going but decided to venture out since it was her senior year. We went and left as soon as her group was done, an hour into the event. That was the last thing we did and the last time D set foot in the building other than collecting things from her locker 2 weeks later when they realized kids wouldn’t likely be going back. DH went to work the following Monday and has been working from home ever since.
Ironically, March 7, 2021 is the day my parents are getting their first vaccine doses. DH and I go on April 12.
March 13, 2020 - we made a rushed decision to go down to DC (from Philly) to fetch our young adult daughter so she could spend the lockdown with us. She was at a small get-together the night before with a college friend who had flown in from Colorado for her sister’s bridal shower. I was pretty worried that my D may have been exposed and then bring it home to us. Just 9 days prior, we had been with her in DC, attending a Flyers-Capitols ice hockey game - in a packed arena, and we had my 82 year old MIL with us. We joked that night about hoping the coronavirus wasn’t in the building or we would surely get it! Wow what a difference that one week made. I remember our discussions about what D should bring with her to our house, and how long she might be with us. At that time, anything more than 2 weeks seemed inconceivable. Coming up now on the one year anniversary - she is still here with us! She and I went back down in April to get more of her stuff, and it felt like a jailbreak to leave our community and state! The traffic on I95 was light but moving fast. We were slightly concerned that we could be pulled over for being out of state. In November her lease was up and she moved fully out of her apartment. She plans to move back this summer (her office return date is now 9/13; it has been pushed back several times over the past year.)
While I feel bad that my D lost this year+ in her young adult life, for my H and I it has been a huge blessing to have her here with us. We all agree that her next move-out will be the hardest yet - she is just such a part of our everyday life now! But, it is time for her to get her life back.
Looking forward to spending more time with our S and his new wife in 2021 - they are paramedics and live in NC. Now they are both vaccinated and once we are, we will start visiting regularly. Our state is moving very slow with the vaccines, so the light at the end of the tunnel still seems far off for those of us who are under age 65 with no complications. Hoping the pace picks up soon!
March 10th, when we learned that Midd was shutting down, and the we needed to drive out to pick up our kid. A day later, it was driven home when the university I was working at put out a notice that all classes were going online after spring break. This was halfway through their spring break, mind you, and I received a personal notification about my class only two days later - basically, the students were told before I even knew that I had to make the jump. Luckily Spring Break was extended for a week.
For me, it was March 17th - St. Patrick’s Day - which was a Tuesday. Taking Metro North into Grand Central Terminal that morning, I was the only person on my train car. Ordinarily it would be standing room only (especially on St. Patrick’s day when commuters are joined by people going to the parade). I knew then and there that we were heading into uncharted territory. That was my last day working in the office and I have been working from home since then.
On Sunday, March 9th we had dinner in a restaurant with our S, then FDIL, and my mother. She wanted to give them their wedding present and we ventured to a restaurant in Queens. I remember the silverware being wrapped and wiping it all down once opened. Then, after the NCAA tournament had been stopped and the NBA suspended its season (March 12), my S called to say they had decided to postpone their 200 person wedding scheduled for March 21. The next day we had lunch with DIL and her parents to discuss details for a smaller ceremony at our home on that date, having rescheduled the reception for 8/8 (how naive were we?). My oldest S, his wife and son came to the house on 3/17, planning to stay for the wedding, however small it would be. On Thursday, March 19, as the NYS lockdown was set for 3/21, the wedding ceremony, too, was postponed until a later date. S1 and his family stayed and lived with us until June and D moved in after quarantining in her Brooklyn apartment for two weeks after her last outside human contact on March 14. We didn’t see the “newlyweds” until May but they had a beautiful micro wedding in our yard on 8/8 and the reception has now been cancelled…for good.
We were on vacation on Sanibel Island and I remember turning to my husband and telling him that schools were closing. On the island, it seemed like we were in a bubble. No one seemed to be thinking about it. We started eating away from people but we did have to fly home. I did bring back the small package of toilet paper we had purchased and my husband thought that was pretty funny; until we got home.
I was taking a once a week painting class at the China Institute in New York City. The last class was on March 4th. We joked that the Institute might be ground zero for New York. (It wasn’t.) Next week class was cancelled.
March 9 we did a grocery store run. There was no toilet paper.
March 14 we started the routine of getting take out from local restaurants once a week to support them.
March 16 our building department closed and all “non-essential” construction was halted.
By March 18 we were wearing masks. Our DIL sent us some that she picked up when she’d been doing research in Bahrain and left to run a small conference at Columbia, but it got cancelled so she didn’t stay with us as a originally planned.
We also got masks sent to us by her parents in Hong Kong.
As for now?
Eventually construction was allowed. The building department was open this summer, but it’s closed again. This time though they know how to work from home and you can drop off plans at the door. We are still only eating take out. My husband goes into the lab, but some days he stays home. All his meetings are on Zoom now. I’m being much more picky about the kinds of jobs I’ll take. DH has been vaccinated, but I don’t expect I will be for a while.
I can’t believe a year has passed already. For me, it was when we went to SAH and son couldn’t go back to college. But I had prepared just in case in February. I had purchased $600 worth of boxed and canned staples, toilet paper, meds, paper towels and hand sanitizer. A few friends made fun of me.
I had my first vaccine last week, the second on 3/18. I’m finally feeling hopeful and ready to partly resume my life in a month.
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