Roasting the Pandemic Marshmallow

Tonight I find myself sitting by my backyard fire pit, watching the kids use a "school night" to do an activity usually reserved for summer vacation, which is roasting marshmallows.  I am struck by just how different today actually is than what I envisioned four months ago.  It was then I secured a site for my 1DOS Albany 5k that was to be held on Saturday.  This was the week I was to be finalizing with sponsors, marking the course, picking up swag, welcoming my co-founder to Albany for the first time and admiring the cool ass shirts we designed.  However, like most things COVID related, my race has been postponed. 

Pressure:  pushing down on me,

Pressing down on you, no man ask for,

Under pressure that burns a building down

                                                                               - Queen and David Bowie

Longing for a sense of normalcy, I have been doing the Orangetheory at home workouts.  It isn't quite the same without my gym family around me, but I seem to be sticking with it and getting it done anyway.  However, I should probably apologize to  OTF corporate for muting their music and choosing instead the Bon Jovi station that today played this oh so appropriate song during a punishing core blast.  Now having the ability to do COVID testing is bringing with it a very busy season at work.  My time on my days off is largely being spent on the phone with nervous employees, arranging schedules and working on work flow.  Adding to this are my duties as elementary teacher, mom of stir crazy children and CEO of two businesses.  Tonight I find myself wishing for a normal day like the ones I had in February where my biggest frustrations were making sure the kids got up on time for the bus and repeating the speech that follows,"you have the flu" to patients dozens of times a day.  

That's the terror of knowing,

What this world is about.

Watching some good friends screaming,

"Let me out!"

With all these things running around my thoughts I am suddenly thinking about what an amazing thing it is to have my nine year old standing in front of me, barefoot, carefully roasting his marshmallow as he narrates the process as if he is the star of his own YouTube channel.....he wishes....  After weeks of horrible weather, being cooped up inside, and using the phrase,"I'm bored" like a comma, yes this was a welcome site.  

Insanity laughs under pressure

As I tuned into the commentary that followed, I couldn't help but smile, and eventually burst out laughing,"You have to turn it slowly.  Don't put it too close to the fire.  It's slow and steady rotation until it is the color of mom's arm.  Be sure it does not end up the color of my arm."  He is a very dark skinned Haitian.  In his mind a marshmallow that color is clearly ruined.  My daughter was commenting it would ok if it were her color, as she is lighter skinned, and so it went, until I had my 14 year old chiming in with his expertise.  The reality is all five of my children have a different approach to marshmallows, everything from the immediate jamming into the fire, lighting it up and waiting to eat it until it is a charred gooey mess, to slow roasting, to nearly raw, sparking an intelligent epic debate defending their point of view, which led to a full on fireside taste test, and a realization, there are other ways to approach the process that taste just as good and at times even better.

Having to adjust to this pandemic has been a challenge for sure, in fact I personally have had several runs at trying to establish a new "normal."  Some things have ended up a charred gooey mess, like when I tried to pluck my own eyebrows,  and others roasted perfection like realizing as much as I miss my gym family and cannot wait to work out with them again, I am more than capable of keeping myself going on my own workouts, a notion I never could have conceived of five years ago.  

This is our last dance,

This is our last dance,

This is ourselves

At the end of the day, I think the trick is to realize although we may have all been given the same pandemic marshmallow, it's all in the approach as to how we make it as palatable as it can be while not being afraid to change trajectory when the approach no longer tastes good.  As we begin to wind down with the corona pandemic and things begin to reopen, it is my hope that in final days of the last dance of isolation we take the time to try new things to help us find the best version of ourselves to launch into our new normal.  Only there we will be able to look ahead and see the best is yet to come.

Sisterhood

I suppose you could say, being the youngest of 3, and the only girl, growing up I really didn't know a whole lot about sisterhood.  I was the tomboy little sister who played basketball on the driveway, and chased fungos at the hand of my dad with my brothers on warm weekend afternoons.  Oh, I had friends who had sisters.  They shared sweaters and scrunchies.  They fought and they hugged.  Truly a culture I was really not all that well versed at, and didn't totally understand.  That is until I went to college. 

I found myself setting out for The University of Iowa in the fall of 1987, arriving a full week ahead of classes to go through the rush process.  My brother, two years my senior, had already attended that school for two years and was firmly entrenched in the Greek system and assured me this was the thing to do.  I had no idea really.  The only thing I did know was I was striking out alone for the first time in my life and launching myself into a sea of 24,000 strangers three hours from home and hoping for the best.  I guess I figured worst case, I would have a week ahead of most people, making it easier to navigate the sprawling campus when  classes actually started, and would likely get to know a friend or two.

I found the rush process to be a bit daunting.  I had grown up a fairly shy obese child who really wasn't sure of anything, and yet I was going to house after house, party after party, trying to put my best foot forward in 20 minute increments.  I'd watch skits, hear them sing, talk to a couple members and try to figure out where it was among these 14 houses I could actually fit in.  Each round cuts were made.  I was invited back to some houses, but not others, and by the end of the week, the field was narrowed to three, and eventually I got a bid for one.  Alpha Gamma Delta.  I called my brother to ask if this was a good thing.  His comment?  "I have several friends there.  They are a very diverse house."

I would find that to be true.  We all came from different places and liked a lot of different things.  Not quite the cookie cutter girls I had seen in the movies.  I would also learn what sisterhood was all about.  I would move into the house my junior year and live with 25 other girls.  Oh sweaters were shared, boys were snuck in, late night deep chats were had after a night out.  There were the formals with many pics of big hair and shoulder pads, and more laughs than I can even begin to describe.  We loved one another when tragedy hit, when there was the loss of a parent for one sister, divorcing parents for others,  not to mention all of the boyfriend related issues that ended with a bottle of Boone's Farm drank out of plastic cups, and a skilled game of quarters.  We had our rituals that bound us together, and an element of community I had never experienced before. Certainly the best years of my college life. 

Then as life has a way of doing, we all drifted off to our various corners of the world.  We got married, we had kids, we raised our families and grew in our careers.  There were Christmas cards, and sisters that remained closer than others, but this is the way life is.  Right?  That is until a little thing called COVID-19 entered the scene.  I suppose it is the dark reality of the body bags lining the New York City, or the eerie quiet of a surreal lockdown none of us could have ever imagined, that have us pausing a bit.  In the pause, for a lot of us, comes the realization of what really matters in the midst of an invisible demon that can claim whoever it wants. 

On Friday, I would find myself parked at  my urgent care, N95 and PPE at the ready seeing patients when a lull would allow me to join the newly appointed Zoom Happy Hour with my sisters.   Back in the day we called it "FAC", code for the pre-party known as "Friday Afternoon Club."  I would look at all of the virtual faces.  We are now scattered across the country in Georgia, Illinois, New York, Arizona, California and Iowa to name just a few of the places.  Yet here we are on the same screen Brady Bunch Style talking about old times, with my sisters in their respective homes, sipping higher end wine from real glasses and laughing.  Pictures were shared, scrunchies were donned, and someone even had a collection of our coveted mascot, the squirrel.

 Side note, I did not understand then, nor do I now, why with every animal in the world AGD would pick the squirrel, nonetheless, they did, and we now all have a weird appreciation for the bushy tailed nut gatherer. 

It is pretty safe to say COVID-19 has had a significant impact on me.  I have a certain amount of nervousness about going to work every day.  I have moved into my guest suite so my exposure will not get my family sick and I have all new precautions for decontam when I get home from work.  So, to take some time on a Friday night to remember a time when life was a bit simpler and laugh with a sisterhood I have loved for so many years was just what I needed, and I am reasonably sure they did too.  When I finally got home that night, I joined a second Zoom call with some of my 1DOS Sharks in Kansas City, only this time it was my turn for high end wine, and laugh a whole lot more with people who have always supported the dreams of my foundation and matter a whole lot to me.

I think in the end we will find that COVID-19 was a vicious monster that claimed a lot of lives, but we will also see it allowed us to resurrect those things in our lives that truly matter.  Going forward, my sisters and I will continue on with our Friday night Zoom happy hour and continue to reconnect after so many years.  As for me, I have made one small change to my office at home.  I needed a less than subtle reminder that in all of the darkness surrounding difficult times, we need to pause and take the time to seek out those in our lives that bring the light and allow us to laugh.  I suspect with a little bit more joy we will be able to see that there is life past COVID-19, and that the best is yet to come.