{"id":51530,"date":"2020-03-23T18:19:54","date_gmt":"2020-03-24T01:19:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/world.edu\/?p=51530"},"modified":"2020-03-23T18:19:54","modified_gmt":"2020-03-24T01:19:54","slug":"living-the-covid-life","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/world.edu\/living-the-covid-life\/","title":{"rendered":"Living the COVID life"},"content":{"rendered":"

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I\u2019ve always enjoyed memes but I never thought I\u2019d come to depend on them to recalibrate my moods.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m a person who loves working from home, using communication technologies, and social media. I also tend towards introversion.<\/p>\n

You would think that shifting to the current context would be easy and even desirable, with so many of my colleagues and organisations in the sector moving to online-only \u2018campuses\u2019 and teaching\/ research from home. I thought so, too, for about three days or so\u2026<\/p>\n

But let me start at the beginning:<\/span><\/p>\n

My COVID life started ten days ago when our family decided to self-isolate, which meant keeping the kids home from school, me working from home, and minimising going out. We had several reasons, including a tri-generational household in which my mother lives with us. She is 85 years old and has several other health conditions. She is not frail, but neither is she incredibly robust. She is her age. We did not want to be cavalier with her health, or that of others.<\/p>\n

Which brings me to our strongest other motivators to isolate voluntarily: we believe that social distancing and \u2013 indeed \u2013 isolation are effective ways to flatten the curve, and we wanted to protect those in our community who may be more vulnerable.<\/p>\n

We are privileged enough to be able to do this. My work can be done from home. My partner is the primary carer in our family. We have a cosy house but there is enough space for us to have rooms to ourselves if we need to. We did not stockpile but we were doing the recommended thing of buying a few extra items each grocery trip in the month or so leading up to when we decided to isolate. We are in a position to be able to absorb the extra costs of home delivery of grocery items, and also the higher costs of accessing things from smaller providers. So, all in all, we will be OK at home.<\/p>\n

For my work, most of it will be fine to deliver using Zoom, with some work in creating more scaffolding resources and reshaping the workshops. It\u2019ll be a challenge on some fronts because I convene a few full day and 2-day events, and they\u2019re not going to be possible via video conferencing. I will have think creatively about these but I am low on brain-space right now, and that\u2019s the thing I\u2019ve found most challenging while living this COVID life.<\/p>\n

Even though I have quite an ideal work-from-home (WFH) situation, complete with two kids (Grades 8 and 5) who are fairly self-sufficient and happy to be proactive about their learning and also amuse themselves, the transitioning workload and persistent static of anxiety is wearing. The speed at which all of this has been happening feels both glacial (it seems to have gone on so long already) yet much too fast (when the decision comes down to everything moving online, it\u2019s a very small window of prep). There is the added load of emotional and social labour that must now be done at a remove, at a time when situations are causing frustration, uncertainty, and fear in the cohorts we support (as well as in colleagues and friends around us).<\/p>\n

I know I can\u2019t be all things to all people, and I do allow for down time and stepping back from the engagement, especially now that social media channels have gained more prominence and relevance as avenues of sustaining community dynamics. It helps a lot that I work with a nourishing, understanding team \u2013 all of whom are also swamped and trying to get through their copious lists of things to do.<\/p>\n

Things I never thought I\u2019d get sick of that I\u2019m starting to get sick of:<\/strong><\/p>\n