"Just start with coffee and do what you can.
It's weird out there.
You're gonna need to stay alert."~ Sweatpants and Coffee
This is getting truer by the day.
It is weird out there, weirder and weirder.
In some ways life is normal, and in others it has changed so dramatically as to be unrecognizable.
Life "out there" is weird.
Businesses are closed, people are wearing masks, the store shelves are empty, and we are uncertain. Circumstances are changing on a daily, if not hourly, basis.
We are unsure of our employment, we are unsure of our finances, we are unsure of whether or not we can get what we need to maintain some sense of normalcy.
It can shake us.
But in here, inside these four walls, life is normal.
I clean, I cook, we talk, we have the same needs and desires.
It is a comfort to do even the most mundane tasks, because they are so normal.
I feel a strange sense of comfort doing the laundry, because it hasn't changed. It piles up, I wash it, and I fold it and put it away. Just like I have done for years.
I make meals.
One thing about all of us being together in the house is that we are all available to eat together.
I am still able to make the meals that we are used to.
So far shopping, while weird, is still happening and I am able to get the things that we like to eat.
I am able to provide healthy meals for my family, and they are glad to have them.
That's normal. That's a comforting daily reality.
The pets don't know that it's weird out there, because they never leave the property, so as far as they know nothing has changed.
One thing I have learned since I am now home all day is that there is always a cat on my bed.
I didn't realize how much time they spend just quietly curled up there.
I think that we need to dwell in the mundane and unsurprising for a while each day.
Live in the little things that haven't changed.
Take solace in the place that is your refuge, your home.
Do a long awaited project. Maybe there is something that you have been meaning to do that you know will make life a little nicer, or at least less annoying,
Paint a room. Put up new curtains. Organize a drawer a day in the kitchen.
These are little low cost projects that will improve the quality of life and make the place that you have to spend so much time just a little nicer.
Be good to yourself and your loved ones by being good to your space.
Bake bread, bake cookies, sew something, crochet.
These outlets are satisfying and creative. They help us feel like something happened, something was accomplished. Someone benefitted, and not just Hulu or Netflix.
I am working on a baby blanket for my spiritually adopted unborn baby.
No, I'll never know who she is, but there is an unborn baby out there, with a mom who is struggling, who will be wrapped in it in a few months.
It's easy to say that it's just a matter of perspective, but I know that there is a lot to feel shaken about.
I am one person who likes to know that I can go about my day without too many wrinkles.
I get nervous when I read too much of the news.
I am learning to let go, and to let God handle the big stuff, while I stay home and take care of the little stuff. Maybe I should have been living more like this all along
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