All Sorts of Things in the Time of Coronavirus and the Great Reckoning

And just like that, our quick 4 day getaway to the beach is over. I've never had a vacation accomplish so many things in such a short amount of time. The kids got to interact with about 6 additional people (our vacation quarantine pod), including another child (Javi couldn't pronounce her name the first 24 hours so he kept calling her "Mango"), they got to spend so much time outdoors with so many new things to see and places to explore. For those of you that don't live in NYC, when you live in an apartment, you can't just throw your kids in the yard for a bit. Going outside requires packing a bag with essentials, loading a stroller, getting your kids fully dressed, taking an elevator, walking to your nearest park (which may not be super close) and knowing the location of the closest public bathroom. And right now, it requires masks and face shields and having to keep away from a million people during your outside excursion. For 4 days, Javi could run outside (which he kept doing unsupervised) in his diaper and no shoes! It was glorious! He also learned that the ground can be hot and figured out how to find cool, shady spots to stand in. 

Ryan and I got to hang, face-to-face, with very dear friends, enjoying drinks, adult conversation and long dinners every night. Our souls were replenished. But, as is always the case with kids, it is easier to manage them at home, so we happily made our way back home on Sunday (and by happily I mean there was too much screentime, a tantrum/vomit incident and I had to sit on the floor of a rented Suburban for 2+ hours to keep the peace). 

I have a few important takeaways from the weekend. To get through the rest of the pandemic, I need to find ways for our family to periodically (meaning every couple of months or so) interact more intimately with friends/family. If both sides take proper quarantining measures before and after, a vacation quarantine pod can be done fairly safely. Humans are not built for isolation!

But, my biggest realization was Ryan's transformation as a father and partner. As he has been unemployed for the last 2 months, the dynamics have shifted at home. As much as I complain about carrying a lot of the management burden for the household, I had a hard time delegating to him. This was my issue, as he offered from the get go to take on more responsibilities. But, I struggled to hand them over. I don't know if it was a control issue on my part, or the idea that I didn't want to get out of the habit since I would most likely go back to managing everything once he got a job. In the last few weeks I've let go, and during vacation, I did the ultimate letting go which was allowing him to wake up with the kids every morning (they were waking up at 5:45am every day) and letting me sleep in until 7:30am (I know it doesn't seem like it, but it was a huge luxury). And you know what? I was a better mother. I had more energy to bring to the kids the rest of the day (because they still run to me first whenever I'm in their sight). It was a huge gift. While contemplating that gift, I also realized how much more helpful he has become as a co-parent. He now actively spots ways to be more efficient without me having to make suggestions. He is anticipating needs and actions. And he is doing it so well. I cannot tell you how much this has changed my quality of life. I feel like we are co-running an operation instead of me being a dictator, constantly nagging an underling. 

Will this dynamic shift back to our previous dynamic once he is employed? Perhaps. But, I feel like advancing in parenting is something that is very hard to step back from. I am hoping it will look more like a rejuggling of responsibilities. It also makes me realize what a difference more paternity leave would do for families. 

Before I get into my random thoughts, I wanted to share that I'm in the process of taking a critical look at my attempts to amplify Black and Queer voices on Instagram. I share posts of people I admire with the hope that people will start following those voices. What I am seeing is that this isn't necessarily happening. I check the follower lists of the people that I'm trying to amplify and am always disappointed to see only a handful of my followers following them. So what does my posting actually accomplish? Although I don't mean it to be, is it basically performative activism? Perhaps I can do more in my posting to showcase the person and maybe that will drive more direct amplification? If you follow me, how do my posts make you feel? Does it make you want to learn more or to follow the person I'm posting? If not, what can I do (if anything) to make you more interested in expanding your feed? I've considered no longer posting, but I don't think silence is the answer either. There is just so much I am learning while listening to different voices and I want people to join me! So, I will continue thinking about better ways to encourage people to expand their feeds. If you have ideas, send them my way!

1. As the Emmy list came out, I'm so thrilled to see so many Black actors nominated! I also was pleasantly surprised to see 8 nominations for the one show I've been watching the last couple of months during COVID. If you haven't seen "What We do in the Shadows," run to your nearest Hulu streaming device. It is a mocumentary series about vampires living in Staten Island and it is my happy place. It makes me maniacally laugh and we all need maniacal laughter during this miserable time.

2. I've decided that something is wrong with my arms. They are unable to hold any type of muscle strength I attempt to gain. I stopped doing barre workouts for a few weeks because of, well, I don't really have an excuse, they just didn't happen. Last week, I did an arm workout and I am still sore. However, I did a leg workout and it was like nothing happened. Why is there such a difference??? Why does lifting my big 'ole babies all the time do nothing for my arm strength? Is there a medical explanation? 

3. The other day, I had a vision of the future of Javi and Liv making fun of us. For some reason, whenever we decide to watch tv, one of us will say, "Fire it up!” (insert giant cringe) I tried to remember when this first started happening, but sadly, I don't think we can blame it on COVID. We are becoming boring, cheesy parents that will cause our children millions of hours of embarrassment. I can't wait. 

4. I've decided to be more explicit about providing context on my photos if we are interacting with other people (insert all of you laughing because we've interacted with less than 10 people in 4 months). I feel we have a responsibility to provide context during this time. I see a lot of images/videos where it is unclear whether people are following the COVID rules. I try to assume that I'm seeing a snapshot of someone's life without context, that maybe those aren't random people they are hanging out with, but part of their COVID pod, and that they aren't wearing masks because even if it doesn't look like it, other people are properly 6 feet away. I know, I know, I'm a COVID rule freak, but I just worry that if we don't set a good example, people already teetering on COVID fatigue will be inspired to flout the rules and the numbers will skyrocket again. I DON'T WANT TO GO BACK TO FULL LOCK-DOWN. 

5. Javi's two-year-old tantrums have been morphing into something new. Before, he would start whining and saying, "help me just a little bit" while hanging on to your body, attempting to climb you so that you will pick him up. Now, he has started this dramatic cry/cough, which, as you can imagine, in the time of Corona, is very jarring. I am wondering if he somehow picked up that a dry cough is a sign of COVID and he realizes this is a way to get our attention. Smart kid. 

6. Ya'll, Liv ain't having nothing from nobody and I'm all about it. I don't know why, but to see such a small, fragile-looking, porcelain doll stare daggers at strangers and stand up for herself against her big brother is VERY satisfying. She knows exactly what she likes, what she doesn't like and she advocates very strongly for her needs. It makes me wonder if a lot of us ladies started out like this and somehow society made us feel we had to act differently. I'm going to protect this part of her just as fiercely as she fights for her right to take up space and to do and eat the same things as Javi. 

7. I hit a new low in terms of COVID grooming. I haven't gotten my eyebrows or lip waxed since early March. Since I'm not seeing people in person, I haven't worried too much about it. However, last week, Javi and I were sitting on the sofa as he was having a snack and he looked at me hard and declared, "Mama has hair on her face." He says this to Ryan all the time and usually says, "Mama has no hair on her face." I asked him to show me where and he pointed to BOTH corners of my mouth. So, I'm waiting on my waxing kit to come in from Amazon Prime. Nothing like a child to tell you the truth. 

Social Pods, Entanglements & Conscious Uncoupling in the Time of Coronavirus and the Great Reckoning

I know I already posted this on my insta stories, but if you have an hour to spare, please watch this conversation between Dr. Yaba Blay, Tarana J. Burke, Glennon Doyle and Abby Wambach about issues with White and non-Black people newly following Black people on social media after a program called Pass the Mic.  Black women took over the instagram accounts of well known White women for a day and the unexpected consequence is that they were flooded with new followers, mainly white women. In the specific instance discussed in the video, a white woman reported one of Dr. Blay's posts within 24 hours of starting to follow her. As they mention, this is the new version of Karen, the I-Karen. The part of the discussion about how you will never understand someone else unless you are prepared to engage with their whole humanity (rage, joy, good, evil, sad, etc.) really hit me to my core. I wish it could be required listening. It challenged me while at the same time making me feel seen and understood. I also really valued the conversation about the inherent racism in Instagram's community guidelines that relies on users reporting things. I could go on, but you should really just watch it.

On the personal front, I'm finding it very hard to be openhearted these days, but I know that I need to find that place in order to reduce the depression/anxiety. My anxiety levels are high because I have family & friends in FL, TX & CA and I fear for their health. It then makes me worried about NY reopening and the caution fatigue that I am experiencing and also seeing in others. My brain is overtaxed with every day safety worries and then add all of the stress about the school situation for Javi in the fall, and if it is going to be remote, how to give him some type of social interaction that is safe, within the guidelines, doesn't require us to take public transportation or an Uber (we sold our car a year ago), meets our nanny's comfort level and can also accommodate Liv's schedule.

People responded to my insta question about how they've managed a social pod and it just reinforced for me that it is a big commitment! Sounds like the pods that have been successful have very clear guidelines on acceptable risks, number of total people, agreements on how to handle breaks in protocol (i.e. family visiting) and are made up with either proximity or easy/safe transportation options in mind. Thank you for sharing your pod-styles with me! Most people said you just really had to trust the other families and hope they weren't having "entanglements" with others. I imagine it is only natural that some "conscious uncouplings" may occur as this pandemic continues. 

I was originally going to make a plea on here for a similarly COVID-conservative family interested in podding and lo and behold, that exact family reached out after my insta question! Ya'll, the GuRaes are currently pod-engaged! We will have to work on some details of the pre-nup (i.e. get our nanny comfortable) and we will have to wait for the actual union to occur after quarantine from our beach trip next week.

Oh, the beach trip. I've never been so excited for a trip in my entire life. Dead serious. Our destination wedding in Cartagena was fun and all, but nothing beats a change of scenery after being trapped in an apartment for 6 weeks, followed by another 3 months of social distancing with only park excursions. I'm a little nervous that we are going to overwhelm our friends with so much excitement and affection that we will never be invited back. 

Since I will be busy interacting with people IN PERSON next week (yay!!!!!) I won't be doing a post. I'm sure the following week, I will have stories about the GuRaes engaging with others for the first time in forever and all the awkwardness that ensued.  

Wishing you all a COVID-free 2 weeks filled with sunshine, love and learning!

Creepy Statues & Internet Scams in the Time of Coronavirus & the Great Reckoning

The Fourth of July no longer has the same feel given our national discussion on systemic racism and the legacy of slavery, and it shouldn’t. It made me think about how weird it is having a national holiday celebrating independence. I looked it up and only the UK and Sweden don't have a national day of celebration. We watched Hamilton Friday night and I just felt so far removed from the story of the US's independence, especially from the men that brought it about (regardless of the youthfulness and modernity of the production). I cringed internally at the line by Angelica, "I’m ‘a compel him to include women in the sequel!" and also at the ways it skirts around the issue of slavery. But, the music is fantastic and the performances were great. Regarding the Fourth, I decided to use it as a day to celebrate the potential our country has to be better. Maybe going forward we should use it as a day to reflect on ourselves as a nation and whether we match up to the true ideals of all its actual citizens, since this will change from year to year, from generation to generation. What a great opportunity to chat about history in an honest way with our friends, family and children and to instill in our children a critical mind when it comes to being a citizen. Thoughts?

Similar to the Fourth of July uneasiness, I've been thinking a lot about the debate on problematic statues. My main thought here is that I think it is weird to have statues commemorating humans. This ties into the idea of idolatry in Christianity and even though I'm Catholic, I've always felt uneasy about the statues to the saints, etc. All humans are flawed. Maybe we can make statues and commemorations of other things? Or maybe we don't need statues? Wouldn't it be nice to have a massive, gorgeous old tree in the middle of a square instead? The conversation reminded me of Memento Park, this creepy park outside of Budapest with old Hungarian communist statues that I visited when I studied abroad in law school. It was so thoughtful in the sense that it wanted to make sure people remembered the period, but it was literally on the side of a country road and you never felt that it was a commemoration. Museums can handle the showcasing of history in more nuanced ways, so let's just do away with statues, okay? ESPECIALLY, if they commemorate something that causes a huge group of people incredible pain. 

And now, an attempt at levity.

1. Ya'll, my consistency in coming in 5th place overall in Mario Kart now has Ryan thoroughly impressed. To give you an example, if I rank 6th or 10th in 2 of the 4 races, I always manage to get 1st or 2nd in one race to move me up to 5th place overall. What does this mean? Do I just need to trick my brain into making 1st place the only acceptable outcome and then let it do the rest? And why isn’t 1st place already the only acceptable outcome??

2. I got scammed by an outdoor company that I was getting ads from on Facebook and Instagram. I ordered this million-in-one bike/trike/stroller thing for Javi because I read somewhere that he should be able to pedal a tricycle and we haven't even given the poor kid a chance to try. Don’t worry, we are hopefully going to get refunded by our credit card. The part that makes me the most angry is not that I got scammed, but that the product they used to scam me with was EXACTLY WHAT WE NEEDED. It had everything that would make it easy for us to use in the city and I cannot find a legitimate product to match it. So, I went with a radio flyer trike that at least folds up a bit, but I'm really mourning that unicorn trike. 

3. A shout out to Halal food trucks and their deliciousness for providing Ryan and I one very fun lunch a week for about $14. I used to spend the same amount every day at work on a Postmate lunch order. That now seems so wildly extravagant and I am thankful for this pandemic for helping me have a better sense of spending! 

4. I don't know if it is just me, but I feel like I live in the twilight zone right now. Seeing people I know post and talk about the virus in places where it is now peaking as if this thing came out of nowhere. HELLO???? Did you think we were just making it all up? I had someone complain to me recently about how depressing it is staying at home and the fear, etc. etc. and I wanted to slap them. We've been living this way for 4 months. Other than walking by strangers at the park and on the street, I have only met up in person with my sister and her kids, a friend and her kid and my former boss. Masks on the whole time except for eating, 6 feet apart for pretty much the whole encounter and outside. Any other socializing has been online. It is rough. I understand that to get through this, people will take some risks, as we will be in a couple of weeks as we head out to the beach for a few days with friends. But just remember, if you can abide by the rules for most of the time, it is better for everyone. This thing isn't going anywhere for awhile. Be smart. Listen to science. This isn't a political issue.

Sorry, that last one was a rant, but I needed to get it out. See you all next week! (BTW, I keep pretending in my mind like each post is the last, but then it doesn’t happen, so......sorry?)

Flavor Integrity in the Time of Coronavirus and the Great Reckoning

Well, I had my biggest meltdown of the COVID era last Thursday night. It took my parents a full hour on the phone to calm me down and then another long chat with my sister the following day. I have been asked to consider anti-depressants. I'm not sure I want to go there quite yet and feel that I have some other options to try before looking into the medication route. My new coping plan is to simply be kinder and more lenient with myself. Living in extremes only brings me misery. Trying to lead a perfect schedule and perfect life during a very difficult time is unrealistic and only brings me misery. Obsessing over our finances and budget and living in deprivation mode only brings me misery. This morning it dawned on me that having less childcare may be the main reason I'm feeling so stretched. So, we are considering bringing our nanny back to full-time in August. Basically, I'm going to try to take things a bit easier over here. Not a strength of mine, so we will see. I am also very aware that my ability to actually do something about my difficulties is only possible because of privilege, financial uncertainties aside. 

(using 2 gifs to show my commitment level)

We watched "Becoming" this weekend (the documentary about Michelle Obama's book) and I nearly cried through the whole thing even though it isn't supposed to be a tear-jerker (at least not for the whole time). Maybe it was remnants of the meltdown, maybe it was reminiscing of a time filled with more hope, maybe it was identifying with parts of her journey, maybe it was exasperation at the limitations of politics or maybe it felt odd to feel hopeful again. I started reading the book when Liv was born and I was up several times a night pumping milk for her. I stopped reading when I went back to work because it reminded me of pumping at night (I know that is weird, I was happy to be finished with it, but also sad), but plan to focus on it again. The documentary really brought home for me how terrible politics is for racism. I'm not saying that there aren't systemically racist laws/policies that need to be dealt with and can only be dealt with through voting and expressing your opinions to your elected officials. I mean that the harder work of really changing hearts is done through more informal and vulnerable means. I enjoyed watching Michelle Obama engage with small groups of people of different ages, hearing people's stories and sharing her own. I totally understand why she doesn't want to go into politics herself. It is too limiting. It also reinforced the importance of doing the hard work of fighting racism within our own families, work circles and friends. As the continued division of this country always comes down to politics, I hope we can all acknowledge it's deficiencies and the way politicians demand division in order to stay in power. That goes for both sides. It makes me sad that the pandemic takes away our ability to engage with people personally and to find opportunities to engage personally with people who are different from us. While the internet has the potential to bring people together, none of us really use it in that way. We mainly stick to our echo chambers. I commit to continuing to diversify my social media feeds, the shows and movies I watch, the companies I buy from and the people I talk to on the street (in a socially distanced way with masks on). I would also like to confess that other than high level elections, I don't pay much attention to local stuff. This is another place where I have major work to do to be ant-racist. I commit to doing my homework for November and making fully informed choices on everything, not just the Presidential election. 

Now for some levity. 

1. In case anyone would like an update on Ryan's quirky culinary tastes, I discovered today that he has a specific strategy when it comes to chip selection at lunch. I've been purchasing a variety pack of chip bags that include Doritos (Cool Ranch & Nacho Cheese), Cheetos, Classic Lays, Ruffles and Fritos and have seen him eat two bags every day at lunch. 

(Here is the man, the myth, the legend with his essential chip bag on the morning commute)

Yesterday, he informed me that he only eats Classic Lays, Ruffles and Fritos with his sandwich (i.e. at the same time he is eating his sandwich) because they don't interfere with the sandwich flavor, and reserves the other, more strongly flavored chips (Doritos and Cheetos) for post-sandwich consumption. He was slightly horrified when I enjoyed a bag of Cheetos with my sandwich. Apparently, I lack flavor integrity.

2.  I ranked higher than Ryan in Mario Kart twice in the last week. Proof below. I've now totally changed my mind about the importance of setup because I found the perfect setup for me. Pink Gold Peach driving a sneaker car with white off-road tires and the standard glider. She's killing it (if you agree that moving from a consistent 5th place to 3rd place at least once in awhile is killing it). 

3.  If you had told me that parenthood would involve the amount of wrestling that is required to care for my daughter, I would have never believed you. Does anyone else have a super active little one? Giving her a bottle, giving her food, getting her dressed, playing with her, changing her diaper. I literally sweat during all of those activities. Javi was more active then most of the other kids we interact with, but he would always sit still for drinking milk, feeding and reading books. Liv has ZERO activities where she is willing to be still. I even tried introducing a Youtube video for diaper changes (something we did with Javi to make it less of a struggle, I know, don't judge me) but she just throws the phone off the table. When I give her a bath at night (which is terrifying and I barely fill up the tub because she is all over the place and I'm scared she will drown) I take her into the bedroom and put her on the floor. She immediately crawls full speed away from me. I then chase her around the room applying lotion to whatever body part I can grab. Then, I put a music toy in her crib, but far from her reach which tricks her into standing to try to get it and I quickly put on her diaper. Then I chase her around the room putting her pajama on limb by limb. First I get an arm, and she crawls away. Then I get another arm, and so on and so forth. By this point, I'm exhausted, but I still have to give her a bottle. First we start with her on my lap, she takes two sips then crawls away. We do this for about 3 ounces, then I put her in her crib. She takes an ounce, then rolls around the crib like a maniac. We do this until the bottle is finished and I'm about to faint. She is so ready to walk, but I can't decide if this will make things better (she can actually move the way she wants to) or if it is going to make it even harder to wrangle her. 

Phew, just writing all of that and reliving it made me extremely tired, so that is where we are going to end this week. Wishing you growth, rest, good eats and some sun for this holiday weekend. Don't forget there is a very real virus out there and do you part to stop the spread!