One of the strangest and saddest parts about the Covid pandemic is the toll it has taken on the economy. For a long time I felt so lucky because my family and I felt safe from the negative effects. My husband is a nurse. Of course he has job security. We are in a pandemic after all; they are going to need nurses! But yesterday he got an email that they will be making adjustments at UW hospitals. Turns out hospitals have been losing a bunch of money too with all the scheduled surgeries that aren’t happening. And with everyone staying home and staying safe, people are doing just that. Not only are they staying safe from the virus, but they are staying safe from car crashes since they aren’t in their cars as much. They are staying safe from sports injuries because they aren’t playing sports. The list goes on and on. And so now the hospitals need to make some adjustments.

So far we know he will be working fewer hours, which means less money coming in every month. So now we need to make some adjustments too. No more Covid projects. (We recently put in a sweet patio with a fire pit and built-in bench : ) No more fancy food. Time to start tightening the belt and actually budgeting.

Maybe this will be a good challenge. All I know is thank goodness this is happening during the summer so we can supplement with a lot of food that we grow ourselves. Guess we will be eating a lot of salads!

I don’t have a whole lot to say on the grander scale of the debate. I am just not qualified. But I want to put down some thoughts for posterity since this has been a major issue. The big question we are all asking is: is it worse to have a bunch of people die from Covid, or to send millions upon millions of people into ruin, which could result in many deaths as well, but they wouldn’t be measured as “died as results of depression caused by Covid pandemic?” There simply is no way to measure that. But which scenerio is worse? I think the answer is obvious for people who have already lost loved ones to the disease. It sounds like a terrible and desperately lonely way to die. If we can minimize the number of people that have to go through that, then we absolutely should. But that doesn’t make my heart hurt any less for the single mother who was a hairdresser and maybe worked another job or two and since the shutdown now has no source of income for the foreseeable future. The stress of that situation is unimaginable. And it is very real right now. It is happening to a lot of people. And none of us know what the government will be able to do to actually get us out of this depression.

There have been protests in many states about the lockdowns. Even the president encouraged people to protest. He wants to open the economy back up because the wort thing for a president seeking reelection is a bad economy. I guess that would be one of the silver linings of this whole pandemic. If it got Trump out of office. I am not at all thrilled about Biden being the democratic nominee (presumptive at this point), but at least there should be a woman as vice (please?!). I am so tired of old white men running this country. Time for a ticket that is at least a tiny bit different from the norm.

Another interesting thing that has been happening recently is that several people within the White House have tested positive for Coronavirus. In a perfect world, both Pence and Trump would get infected. Bigly. I don’t care whether it killed them or not, I just want them to get it. I want to see what Trump would have to say after that experience. See whether he thinks it makes sense to try and prevent people from getting it. See if he really thinks the economy is important enough to essentially sign a death certificate for a bunch of people in his age bracket. Because that’s the reality of the death tolls. It’s nicknamed the “boomer remover” for a reason.

Another aspect of this situation that is coming to light is the mental toll social distancing is taking. We know that the virus is dangerous, and we know that we want the economy up and running again soon. But so far, people have been abiding by the Stay At Home orders out of respect to the system, respect for the disease and knowledge that we can and should all do our part to help slow the spread of infection. But people all over the world have started reaching their breaking points. People know they shouldn’t be going out or hanging out with friends, but they can’t take being isolated anymore. And I totally get it. I want to have a “Quaranteam” too. But with my husband’s exposure to everyone at the hospital it just isn’t safe for other people to be around us. We can’t limit our contacts with people the way others working from home can.

But we want to hang out with people. We are desperate for time with friends. Zoom chats and FaceTime calls just aren’t cutting it. I have friends and family members who are pregnant or have new babies and I want to throw showers and hold the new little bundles of joy. I want to help. I want them to know I care. More than just a phone call kind of care. My daughter keeps talking about her daycare and how much she misses her friends. We think we are actually going to have her go back for two days a week starting in June. For her sake and ours. So far there haven’t been a lot of news stories about infections being traced to daycare centers, or large outbreaks being reported there. So we are going to give it a go. Hopefully it will give some small sense of normalcy back to us. We need it so badly.

In closing, I would just like to say Thank Goodness for streaming services (Netflix, Amazon Prime, Disney, YouTube – you are a big reason we are getting through this)! And internet!! And the ability to Zoom and FaceTime!!! I cannot imagine going through this even 20 years ago. The economy is taking a hit right now for sure, but it would’ve come to a grinding halt if this had happened before the internet was around.

And a big personal Thank You to my yard. I love you so much. I may have to write a poem to you. We would be going crazy without you. The kids play in our yard and I have spent more time (and a little bit of coin) on gardening and yard related projects. It has absolutely kept us sane and released a whole bunch of stress during this anxiety inducing time. Now if only there was a safe way of opening playgrounds back up . . .