I remember feeling uneasy in early March that schools weren’t being mandated to close yet, despite the threat of Covid-19 being very well reported in other cities. Public schools in New York were shut down on March 16. Thousands of lives would have been saved if officials decided to close schools and other businesses even just a week earlier. I think about this a lot now because 15 weeks later, with Covid-19 cases surging in other states, I wonder what the rest of the year will be like.
We’ve been staying home for the past 15 weeks, with minimum contact with other people. I’ve only gone to the grocery store, my in-law’s apartment, and school to pick up things when it closed for good this summer. Our summer CSA share season has started, so I pick up organic vegetables every two weeks. I try to be very strategic with shopping trips so I don’t have to go more than absolutely necessary. We are very careful to wipe packages down when they arrive and wear masks whenever we are outside our apartment. There are days when we don’t leave the apartment at all.
I’ve mostly adjusted to this lifestyle and feel like we can keep on going until there is a vaccine. I’m used to not seeing my family for a long time, since they’re all the way in the Philippines, so video calling is our normal way of keeping in touch. I’m using this time to reorganize our apartment so I can have a better setup for homeschooling until we can find a new school.