A rock, shaped like a turtle, sits on my kitchen table
waiting for me to finish painting it.
My dvd player is set up downstairs to Eirobics. That’s a car-crash of Aerobics to Irish dance
music. And, as I was once told by a
momentary dance partner, “It’s amazing you can play guitar because you have
absolutely no rhythm.” So much for
putting a woman at ease. I dance because
no one IS watching.
My dogs get taken out every hour and a half now. I just open the door and say, “I’m kicking
you out!” And they go to the dog yard,
bark at squirrels, load the lawn up, and come back and sit on the step to come
in for a treat.
Those are some of the basic things that are breaking up the
boredom of the Social Distancing. That,
and, as of March 31, Netflix will discontinue carrying the Father Brown Murder
Mystery series so I have to watch as many episodes at night as I can squeeze in
between now and then. Six days to go.
I wish that I could say that about the soft lock-down we are
all in: six days to go. It would be a bit easier if we all knew how
long we have to tough this out. But we
don’t. And people can’t seem to restrain
themselves from using words like “months” when we should really use words like “weeks.” The latter seems like it might be
shorter. Let’s be honest, 8 weeks is the
same as 2 months. But weeks always seem
like an emotionally shorter duration.
The initial emails from Headquarters indicated that while the
Governor said “non-essential” state workers should work from home; we, in
hospital land, were all considered, at that point “Essential.” Well, when all is said and done, on the other
side of this health crisis, I hope I can still be essential enough to be
retained on staff …. Because within 2 days I was sent home to work. Not because I am special. I am aware of that much.
So I wanted to offer a few thoughts on how I plan to survive
this work-from-home phenomenon. I still
want to feel like I am a productive member of staff. I still want to keep up with my team at work
that I support. I also don’t want to
swirl the drain of depression in this extended period of uncertainty. This is my plan. Feel free to pirate some ideas from it, if it
will help you.
- I still set my alarm clock. Keeping a normal routine and normal hours of a work week will be as important in getting through this as it will be when I transition back to driving into the office. Mindset: this is NOT a vacation in any shape, matter or form.
- I get showered and dressed. I jokingly said to my mother a few weeks ago that if I got sent home to work the first place I would go to is Kohl’s to buy a couple of pair of new pajamas. The truth is, I get dressed and show up for work every morning; wherever that is.
- I put my make up on even though my dogs love me just as I am, like the Lord does. That is because without my make up on, in a word, I look like crap. This happens with age. I look pale and blotchy and have circles under my eyes. You’d think I was seriously ill, instead of just run o ver by the train called “Midlife.” When I look at myself at the mirror in the washroom as the day goes on, I want to see someone who looks fine, not otherwise.
- I start the morning with normal tasks BEFORE clock-in time. I feed my birds, the cat, my dogs. I eat a basic breakfast and wash up the dishes. I can’t work well in an environment that is cluttered. The table is then set up to do my work. My laptop, telephones (land line and cell), some worksheets are in front of me and my bag of work supplies on the chair next to me.
- I am targeting drinking a full water bottle every day so that’s with me too. When you get an illness they tell you, basically, “rest and fluids.” I’m not sick; but I’m taking preventive action, starting with the fluids. I broke down and made a latte at 2pm today because I was losing steam.
- I log in the amount of times that I check my office voice mail. I am keeping a work log so that all the tasks get done. I’ve carved in some afternoon time of professional development. I am finishing the EQ (Emotional Intelligence) book that I got a few months ago at the work seminar I attended. I will be up to date on my online training for work.
- I actually stop for lunch. I haven’t been doing that at work lately because the lunch groups I have eaten with have retired or disbanded over the past couple of years. It is good to get my mind onto something else during the work day other than the news and reports of illness.
- I touch base with colleagues who have to go into work to bolster their morale and offer support.
- At the end of the work day, I check my voice mail one final time and then put all work related stuff away.
- I make myself some sort of decent supper and then plan to do a bit of up & down stairs to do laundry, or the eirobics enterprise.
- I pray to center myself in God’s strength. I do not pretend to know how or why this is all happening. But I will walk every day I am given with peace if it is up to me. In the morning at breakfast I read 5 pages of Sr. Faustyna’s “Divine Mercy in My Soul” diary. In the evening I do some meditation prayers to make sure God still remembers my voice.
- Then, I turn on my TV for distraction. I don’t want information. I want entertainment. Keeping a sense of humor through crisis is very important. When I shut it off at the designated “bed-time,” I am subtly aware that none of what I watched exists in the world we know the way it did four weeks ago. I feel that reality has shifted. It unsettles me for a moment, I must admit. Then I put it back in God’s hands and turn in for the night. He’s up all night anyway.
· Years ago, I used to joke among my friends, “Pray
now: avoid the rush.” Now, we are living it.
Know that whoever you are, my readers, we are not alone. Never have been, never will be. When we are on the other side of it, it will
not be because we are Republicans, Democrats or Independents. It will not be because we were smart or funny
or talented. It will be because it was
given as one more gift to us beyond Life itself… An undeserved, gracious gift… the gift of
health.
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