Pandemic Narrative, Part 1

I’m writing this in the minutes following the government declaring a national emergency in regards to the spread of COVID-19. So far this event has progressed at such a frightening rate, it occurred to me today that it might be a good idea to document the things that are happening to keep track of the pace. Of course, since this is my blog, much of what I write about here will be filtered through my own point of view. Not all of us will have the same experience as all of this rolls out. All I can offer is my own perspective.

Since I’ve done a lot of Lists of 10 here on the blog before, I think that might be a good format to follow for this as well — 10 points of what is either happening in the world in the moment or what I’m doing in my best efforts to cope and survive. 

So, here are 10 observations or comments, in no particular order: 

*To start off…I’ve been walking the face of this godforsaken planet for a wee bit longer than half a century now, and I’ve never seen anything like what is going on with this pandemic, and the worst part of it all is how it’s only getting started here. No wait, the worst thing might be that all the toilet paper and hand sanitizer and disinfectant wipes are sold out across the land. (I’m starting to think toilet paper might become currency when the virus apocalypse really kicks in.) No, hold on: The worst part of it is how our government is being operated by an incompetent collection of clown-shoes-wearing bumbles when we need experts in charge more than ever.

*A few weeks ago, I had won a pair of VIP tickets to see the Lumineers at Xcel Energy Center. I was excited because I really like the band, and have yet to take in a VIP experience of any sort. I even worked on growing out my beard for a few weeks, so it would be scraggly enough to have proof I was the fan of a band who played the kind of music Mumford and Sons would have if they’d grown up on the western plains or the Rocky Mountains instead of the UK. I’d hoped the virus spread would be slower and it would make sense to take the chance at going, but it didn’t work out. I was ready to give up my tickets right when I found out the concert had been postponed until September. Yay! Now I just need to stay alive until September. And I can get rid of the beard, which frankly is probably a trap for virus-tainted droplets anyway.

*On the subject of getting rid of the beard: The whole idea of not touching my face, which is proving a challenge, makes the simple act of washing my face feel like a spa day. Not that I know much about what a spa day would feel like, because what am I, Ryan Gosling? But face washing has never felt as luxurious as it does when you’re trying so hard not to touch it during the rest of the day.

*I started spring break today, officially. I have a doctor’s appointment this week — which was set pre-pandemic — and other than that I have no legitimate reason to leave my home. I mean, I’ll go outside to walk the dog and get the mail, but to go to a movie or a store, or meet someone for lunch? I may not go anywhere until I have to return to school at the end of break. Unless….

*Yesterday, Gov. Tim Walz declared a statewide peacetime emergency. He did not, however, close the schools. About ten states have, but we aren’t one of them…yet. It’s my hope that by the time my spring break ends, he’ll wise up and rectify this. You see, I know what it’s like in a school. It isn’t, “Oh, it’s just a bunch of kids and they aren’t the ones getting sick.” It’s the parents who come through. It’s ALL OF THE ADULTS who work there, many of whom travel from building to building, sometimes during the same day. And as for those kids, even if they aren’t typically getting sick, they’re very effective carriers. Generally, I like to think my immune system is pretty robust; for example, I’ve only had about one week worth of colds in the past two and a half years. But this new virus is a big unknown, and I’d rather not try taking it on. As strong as my immune system might be, I spend my day with coughers and wipers and scratchers and pickers. I’ve been coughed on in such close proximity I’ve been able to taste them. I know how bad the disease vector of the public school is first hand, so I know how much potential difference it could make to get it off the game board for a few weeks. Because social distancing? In a classroom? No. It’s not possible. 

*There is more food in my house right now than there probably ever has been during my entire adult life. I usually shop a week at a time, which can leave my kitchen not unlike Tyler Durden’s by the end of the week. I am fully stocked now though, and I plan to ration. Not down to anything ridiculous like three Cheez-Its per hour, but a whole lot less snacking and a whole lot more of respecting serving sizes. I could even wind up dropping some weight because of this, which would give me a nice self-esteem boost to enjoy for the three weeks I’d have until the virus kills me off. Until then, I’m fully prepared to settle in and let my introverted superpowers carry me through as far as they can. 

*I’m filling time by watching TV, which is becoming a trigger. I often have news on as background noise, but there’s nothing about that right now that isn’t scary. Even normal TV is scary though, when you see people touch their faces, or shake hands, or hug, or high five, or fist bump, or sneeze, or cough, or wipe their nose, or not wash their hands long enough…I’m sure you get the picture. I also plan on reading a lot, which will be easy since I have a formidable To Be Read pile. This is a part of it (full-disclosure: I’ve already read about 25% of these, but just don’t have anywhere else to keep them).

*I’m also going to use the time to get some writing done. I’ve got one book I’m starting and another I’m preparing to revise. I have to say some state-mandated weeks off from school would help quite a bit with getting things done for the other job.

*I’m honestly torn between wanting to keep myself as hyper-informed about what’s happening as I can so I know what we’re all up against, and wanting to just watch The Office and rock out to old Styx albums to pretend the world is still a normal place. It makes me wonder what it will be like afterward, however long it takes us to achieve afterward, when we’ll be able to put all of our previous concerns into a new perspective. 

*Today I plan on dusting off the Xbox and starting an open world game I’ve never played before but have had lying around for the longest time. An open world game is one where you just kind of wander around through the expansive setting of the game, interacting with different characters, completing missions and quests, and just living your game life. 

I’m pretty sure there won’t be any scary viruses in there.

13 Hours

I had parent/teacher conferences yesterday. My school day officially began at 7:30 AM and ended at 8:15. It was a long day. I kept track of what happened throughout. Here’s a glimpse into an extra long day-in-the-life of an elementary school teacher.

7:15

It’s -6 degrees when I leave, and a good 45 minutes earlier than I normally would. My first conference isn’t until 7:50, but we’re expected to be there at 7:30 for contractual hours. I want to be there before 7:30 because I know if I’m not, the parking lot at the end of the building right outside my classroom will fill, and walking out to my car at the opposite end of the school at the end of the day will feel like the Bataan Death March.

8:00

I have two morning conferences. Thankfully they’re both great kids and should be easy. I get through the first one relatively easy, even though I have to think through my words deliberately because it doesn’t yet feel like my brain is ready to form ideas, or my mouth is ready to form words properly. I would love to be at home now, having taken out Freddie, both of us having eaten breakfast, and both of us already napping on the sofa to finish up any leftover sleeping we still had to accomplish.

9:06

The safety patrol kids are arriving. Oh no. I forgot it was Dress Like Your Favorite Book Character Day. I mean, I knew it was, and I still choose to wear a school sweatshirt since that seems like something both comfortable and acceptable to wear for a conference day. But having the kids dress like book characters means 1) accomplishing nothing for at least the first 30 minutes of the day, 2) people hoping for, if not demanding, others pay extra attention to them because of their costumes, 3) people making fun of each other’s costumes, 4) people playing with their costumes all day as they slowly come apart, and 5) the extra chaos that comes with adding an x factor into a building already populated by somewhere in the neighborhood of 500 kids. 

9:27

A kid walked in with a Star Wars t shirt and a Pokemon sweatshirt for his book characters. I made the mistake of calling him “Pikachu-bacca. It was a mistake because now at least 12 kids are saying it over and over and over, and he’s basking in the attention.

9:50

Somehow a spontaneous argument about whether or not worms are mammals, independent of everything I’m trying to talk about, has started up.

10:27

I’m passing out papers for them to work on finding the areas of parallelograms. I have one more paper in my hand, that needs to go to the girl Tik-Tok dancing three feet away from me. (If you are unfamiliar with Tik-Tok, count your blessings.) “Whenever you manage to finish up your dancing, I’ve got some things for you to do,” I say to her. She takes about fifteen seconds to complete her moves, then takes her papers, completely oblivious to my sarcasm.

11:30

The temperature has gone all the way up to 9 degrees. This means outdoor recess on my day of recess duty. Hoo-ray. I knew there was a reason I wore a hood today. (Let’s not kid ourselves — I wear hoods almost every day. My daily fashion routine approximates what would be commonly seen at a college football game on a Saturday afternoon in October.)

12:04

Recess: 

Some extraordinary drama played out as one member of The Crew — our very own collection of disrespectful bullies — was working to separate herself from the others, and oh my, how they were not having any of that. We also had the usual football game was going on, as always, with absolutely no pass rush for some reason. One kid tried to dump his coat on the ground. I negotiated him back up to wearing it with at least the sleeves on. There was a group on the swings in the dead of winter, believe it or not. A group of six girls were saying they were going to follow me the whole time, until they realized I was keeping my playground monitoring to a very small area. Another group of girls had picked up large and seemingly unbreakable pieces of snow, called them their snow babies, and tried to break them by dropping them from the playground bridge. Also, for at least twenty of our thirty minutes, there was a yeti hunt going on. I never heard how that turned out.

Deep snow on the playground

1:21

The kids are working on opinion essays over Google, sending me their work for review and feedback as we go. I actually enjoy this; it gives me some insight into what agents and editors do when they review manuscripts, and even gets me thinking ahead in my writing as I try to anticipate what feedback I might receive from someone as I’m drafting. The topics I’m looking at today: “Why Math is Cool,” “Longer Summer Breaks,” “Why People Should Exercise,” “Climate Change,” and “Electric Cars are Good and People Should Use Them.”

1:45

I’m in the middle of what will prove to be a ten-minute conversation at lunch about how bridesmaids dresses never support boobs properly, and how inconvenient it is. I started in the Elementary Education program at St. Cloud State in my junior year, which means I have been overwhelmingly surrounded by women for some 30-odd years now. Consequently, I have been on the sidelines for conversations such as this so many times I’m numb to them. 

2:38

I dropped the class off at the media center, checked my mailbox in the office, and came back to my room. It just occurred to me that even though I’m still stuck in this old brick schoolhouse for  close to another six hours, the only Have-Tos on my list are 20 minutes of read aloud, making it through dismissal without a headache, and three conferences. This means I have what amounts to approximately four hours of prep time this evening. I might be able to get out of here on Friday with no work to bring home for the weekend whatsoever. I now have a goal.  

5:38

My conferences are done. I’m here for another two and a half hours. I wish I had the stamina and willpower to actually buckle down and write next week’s lesson plans, but I know that won’t happen.

5:45

We’re all so thankful we have a PTO who arranges for us to have dinner on conference nights. Plus we had Texas Roadhouse donate a whole bunch of food. Free food is good. However: I’ve been to Texas Roadhouse twice, and each time I walked out feeling a little ill. But their salad dressing and croutons are amazing. I could have eaten a bag of those croutons like movie theater popcorn. By the time I’d spent 45 minutes in the lounge picking at food and talking with the people coming and going, I felt pretty certain the chances of my planning getting done were next to gone.

7:00

I just realized I still have over an hour to be here. I really could get some things done, and I really tried to. But it became too easy to come up with a question about the schedule that I needed to check with someone else about, which led to roaming the halls looking for the right person or people, which led to talking to other people, which led to a chain reaction of distractions that were all too effective at keeping me away from my plans. By 7:30, I knew I was a lost cause.

8:02

My mind is now incapable of productivity. I did get a good portion of my lesson planning completed, but I’ve also found some great time-filling activities to keep myself occupied: I’ve posted the picture day schedule in the staff work room. I’ve organized my classroom library. I switched out the colors of Sharpies I keep in the pencil holder on my desk instead of the giant Sharpie box hidden away in my desk. I may have occasionally checked Twitter. 

8:15

The call is made, and we’re officially released to the wild. Overall it wasn’t a bad day; to be honest, most of them aren’t. I’m lucky I have a class that largely gets along, and even the few kids that occasionally don’t usually keep their obnoxious drama contained to themselves or they save it for lunch and recess when I don’t have to put up with it.

Time to go home and fall asleep on the couch with a dog curled up in my lap.

Vinyl

There’s a thing going around my corner of Facebook right now when people are “giving the task” to each each other to list ten albums from the vinyl era that had influenced their taste in music. This comes with the added conditions of “no explanations, no reviews, just covers.” Well, screw that. I’ll list my ten albums here because I’m not doing another one of these Facebook tag games that will fill up my page with album covers if I don’t get to say anything about them. 

But what about this other condition, “the vinyl era?” There are no specific starting and stopping years to define when this was. It could be argued the vinyl era started when records existed, which went back into the 1800s. I think the easiest definition would be the years between the 1950s and 1980s when records were the primary way to buy commercial music. 

For me, the vinyl era stopped in the summer of 1986, as I was getting ready to move to college. I believe the last records I bought were “Please” by the Pet Shop Boys, and “Fahrenheit” by Toto, both of which I picked up during a trip to Musicland at the Northtown Mall just weeks before moving into my dorm. Because of that, no album on my list is more recent than that. Not to mention that my musical tastes were pretty much cemented by the time I finished high school, so anything coming after that wouldn’t be appropriate.

I began leaning more toward cassettes once I started driving, since they were readily portable and lent themselves to the creation of actual mix tapes, of which I made so many my parents should have invested in Memorex stock. I still own one mix tape called “Summer of 87” which is pretty great. It was about this time that brought in the different forms of Walkman personal cassette players we loved desperately since they let us bring our music everywhere. Because of my experience with Walkmans and the many cheap generic knock-offs I’ve owned in my day, I’ll occasionally feel half a beat of nostalgia when I hold a pair of AA batteries in my hand.

Anyway, here’s my list. As always, even though the blog has been on life support for a number of months, the rule of listing things in no particular order still stands: 

*REO Speedwagon: Hi Infidelity
The biggest album in the world when I entered junior high, which was about the time I first began discovering music on my own. A great pop-influenced rock album which I argue still holds up today.

*Styx: The Grand Illusion
My first exposure to Styx was when my mother bought Paradise Theater because of that pretty “The Best of Times” song. “The Grand Illusion” had more songs on classic rock radio than any other Styx album, so that was one of my earlier purchases. Close to forty years later, I will still turn up “Come Sail Away” when it comes on the radio.

*AC/DC: Back in Black
My first rebellious album, since my parents were convinced there was something at least mildly satanic about the band. (Granted, they did name an album “Highway to Hell.”) My introduction to hard rock. 

Asia: self-titled
This was where I learned what a supergroup was. The members were all formers from major prog bands of the 70s, which automatically gave the band a respectable pedigree. It was much more of a pop album than a prog album, but it was my first touchstone of progressive music.

Bruce Springsteen: Born to Run
The record that helped me figure out so much about life. The “All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten” of rock albums. 

Def Leppard: Pyromania
It’s impossible to explain to people who weren’t following music in the early 1980s what a cultural behemoth of an album this was, especially to the junior high/high school crowd, right down to the urban myths about what was really being said in the foreign-language four-count at the opening of “Rock of Ages.”

Rush: Moving Pictures
The first modern progressive album I owned. “Asia” was a bunch of prog dudes who didn’t get along that well trying to cash in on their names and reputations. Rush was pure. 

John Mellencamp: Scarecrow
I grew up in a rural bubble surrounding the outer ring of Minneapolis suburbs, which was just rootsy enough to relate to the sensibility and sound of this. I’m not saying it would hold when measured against something like “Born to Run,” but it fell into the same straightforward, storytelling rock sound. 

Journey: Escape
Another record initially bought by my mother, this time for that pretty “Open Arms” song. I loved “Don’t Stop Believin’” before it was a national treasure. I loved “Stone in Love” even more, because it rocked so much harder. I thought “Still They Ride” was the superior ballad on the album by far. And the title song was just the anthem someone fighting his way through junior high needed in his corner.

Queen: Live Killers
I actually didn’t own this on vinyl, but had the cassette. It was perfect: a double live album with what amounted to a separate LP on each side of the tape. This was my frequent Walkman companion, drowning out the surrounding idiocy of a thousand school bus rides, and providing me with the first epiphanic moment of my life, when I really, really heard Brian May’s layered “Brighton Rock” guitar solo during a high school football game.

So there you have it. If you’ve ever had questions about where and how my lifelong music obsessions began, those ten albums had no small role.