October, finally

Two weeks ago I sat at my dining room table, writing to the sound of rain. This is the sound I wait for, every September. The rain was fleeting, but it soothed the edges of my frazzled nerves.

I went for a run after school today. I'm oddly energetic on Friday afternoons, especially on Fridays when I end with a class that never fails to fill my cup. I was in a strange headspace; this week has been particularly hard. But I left school feeling good and wanting to move in the cool sunshine.

It cools off at night now; we still sleep with a fan, but I don't kick away the covers. One night this week I was cold enough to wear socks to bed -- what a lovely feeling. Sunny days aren't oppressive, the way they feel in late August, with our matted lawn, crisp and colorless. The leaves have begun to turn, and they are beautiful. I love the bursts of color on sunny Saturdays in October; this year, I know they'll make me miss our weekend soccer games. 

I missed them last year, too, but I missed a lot of things last year. 

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These days, our morning routines go like this: Suzannah and I are up early, before the boys. She starts the coffee maker, which Matt has set up the night before, and she drinks one cup with her breakfast. Milk, two teaspoons of sugar. I'm never hungry at that hour, and I don't like to drink coffee quickly, so I simply shower and dress, and the two of us are out the door before dawn. I drive through my favorite espresso stand before we get to school; I discovered them twenty years ago, when I used my lunch break to rush back to my apartment and take my new pug puppy out to potty on the scrap of lawn next to the stairs. In those days, I ordered a black and white mocha and drank it on my way back to school. Now, I stick to Americanos, sometimes black, sometimes with a splash of cream.

On the days when I take Suzannah to school, we park in the teacher lot and walk in together. She gives me a quick hug and heads off towards the Commons area or to hang out with her friends in a patient colleague's classroom, and I walk up the stairs to my new office, where I have extra morning planning time. I've been on a part-time contract since she was born, so I'm not required to be here at this hour -- but Matt and I decided to choice Suzannah into my school, so we share the responsibility of transportation. The extra time feels lovely right now. I'm a morning person by nature, and those extra hours in a quiet space mean it's easier for me to leave my laptop at my docking station at the end of the day. Last year, I never really succeeded at establishing a boundary between work and home, because I taught my classes through that screen at the center of my house.

On the days when I take Isaac to school -- the privilege of a position that is still technically part-time -- we can all sleep just a little longer, or at least we're not as rushed. Matt doesn't need to make himself presentable before he rolls out of bed to drive her to school, and he doesn't need to worry about snagging a spot in the teacher lot -- my school is still under construction, and parking is at a premium. When I go in later, I park behind the football field, nowhere near the entrance that is closest to my classroom. Or any entrance, really. I walk along the track, then up a long paved path to the back entrance next to the health clinic, and then I cross the Commons area and make my way to the stairs that lead to the second floor, where I share an IB office and a classroom.

But it's okay. A year ago, we didn't go anywhere. We drank our coffee and ate our breakfast and logged onto our computers in different rooms of our house. As much as I loved wearing my favorite gray sweats underneath whatever reasonably professional look I managed to put together on top, those gray sweats weren't worth it. As much as I loved having some really sweet time with my family, knowing that it was an unexpected gift -- after all, my kids are not at ages when I would expect to see so much of them, and I really loved it -- it wasn't the natural order of things, and I know how much they need to be with their peers (and please, no one needs to lecture any teachers about this). But I won't write about that here tonight. I tried to write about it a year ago, when I was still trying to justify my paycheck to friends and family who didn't seem to think I deserved it.

I haven't found my sweet spot yet, not at all. I counted it as a victory that I found my teacher mailbox in the main office all by myself for the first time last Friday, without Kailey holding my hand (though she did cheer me on, and I choose to believe it was not entirely mocking). I can make copies now. But I haven't found my groove, that place where I'm actually ready to greet students at my door because everything they need is printed and ready to pick up (and they know the routines to do that) or displayed on a screen (which is now a fancy new Smart Board). Kids haven't had to ask permission to pee in a very long time, so I haven't been consistent with hall passes. We have a system now, but everything, all of these really basic things, are an evolving process. I have to remind kids all day long to wear their masks correctly, which is the only issue I haven't encountered before, and it's the one I care about most right now. Usually, all it takes is eye contact and tapping my own. But it's unmooring, to say the least. All of it. Learning to be human together again. To read each other's signals. To constantly evaluate risk, and maintain that essential connection at the same time. It all matters so much.

This is what it means to be back in a classroom full-time. It's too crowded, of course. I'm no stranger to over-crowded classrooms; my first of teaching, I had 42 students in my first period class. But during a pandemic, when we have to provide seating charts for contact tracing, full classrooms bring a different level of anxiety. The first time I stood in front of a full class, I found it difficult to breathe, and it wasn't because of my mask.

Speaking of which: teaching through a mask isn't my favorite, but it's infinitely better than teaching through a screen. I'm watching schools in other parts of the country -- and, this week, a private school in my own state -- close because Covid is tearing through their classrooms, and my anxiety rises. My anxiety rises, and so does my anger. My whole body thrums with it. I am so grateful to live in a state with a mask mandate, because it is the best chance we have of keeping kids in school without putting them at even more risk. I'm furious at folks who think that doing this tiny thing is giving into "fear." I'm furious at folks who think that protecting vulnerable members of our community is an imposition on their personal freedom, that we should expect them to "stay home if they're scared." As if we should render them invisible. As if we haven't already. 

Right now, I just want my son vaccinated. Sometimes I think it will be a miracle if he can avoid quarantine until then. I found myself murmuring in the car two weeks ago, Please let him just get to run in his first cross-country meet. And please just let him not get sick. Sure, he'd probably be fine, right? But look, this mama has already experienced what it's like to have a healthy child suddenly hospitalized at Mary Bridge Children's, with a pediatric nephrology team taking care of him. 

Is that what it means to "live in fear"? 

We were lucky. We were so lucky. And on a normal weekday, we waited for hours in the ER for a bed. I would be so terrified to need any sort of hospital care now, when we can't assume a bed will be available at all. Washington is taking on transfers from Idaho. My home state is rationing medical care. My best friend who works for a clinic in Minnesota reports that they're struggling to find open beds for non-COVID patients.

Most healthy children don't suddenly go into kidney failure, but some of them do. Don't come at me with your statistics, especially if you're too precious to wear a mask for twenty minutes inside a grocery store. I think a measure of our humanity might just be our willingness to wear that stupid mask to protect someone else's child. That's the only sort of world I want to live in. So I'm pretty depressed these days.

*

Anyway, my son managed to escape quarantine before his first cross-country meet last week. And my greatest fear was not, honestly, that he would get sick -- because he is incredibly conscientious about wearing a mask and because we are lucky enough to live in a district that requires them. I just know that he needs these experiences, these connections, and I want him to have them.

He ran hard, with absolute determination, and he took third overall and first for his school. Yesterday he shaved something like forty-five seconds off his time; he threw himself against the fence, panting and red-faced but clearly pleased after he crossed the finish line. He did not get any of this from me. I require a tremendous amount of validation from for huffing around my neighborhood for awhile. I was highly allergic to P.E. and running the mile until P.E. classes were no longer required. Listen, I was the kid vomiting at the side of the track because I really wanted that stupid A on my report card. (I'm told P.E. doesn't work like that anymore and I am so glad.) 

Cross-country is a perfect pandemic sport, and perfect for my high-energy son who is very active but has zero interest in "organized" sports. I watched him run, and then I watched him bounce up and down and cheer for every single teammate until they crossed the finish line. This is what it means to be part of a community. Toxic individualism tells us that our "personal freedom" is what we should fight for, instead of the greater whole. But we are part of something bigger than ourselves.

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I've tried to write here so many times in the last two weeks, since the afternoon when I sat at my table, listening to the rain. I don't know how to tell all the stories that matter right now.