Wednesdays in January 2021

 There was a time, when I was a kid, that for like a month it would flood every Tuesday. It would pour rain on Monday evening and over night then Tuesday we'd watch the water rise and cross the roads. The water would resend by the weekend, then another big storm would roll in Monday night and by Tuesday afternoon the water was crossing the road again. This is what Wednesdays in the month of January 2021 have felt like so far. As predicted the turning of a page on a calendar to a new year did not magically make all the countries problems disappear. The fresh start and optimism about a new year last exactly five days.

 It started with the first Wednesday of the year, January 6, 2021. I was at work, being a safety attendant for an adult patient. I spent the morning occasionally checking twitter, seeing pictures of a protest in DC, but not really paying attention to it. By lunch, when I was in the area in the cafeteria that is set aside for employees to eat safely distanced from each other, the protest had turned into a full on insurrection. (Let me pause here to say I'm not confident I could've really told you exactly what the word insurrection meant five weeks ago, but here we are.) I sat in a room full of Black and brown people, all essential works who have been on the front lines of this pandemic for upwards of a year at this point, as the only white person in the room, as we watched white supremacists attach and try to topple democracy.  There were audible gasps from this crowd as they questioned among themselves how these clowns could literally storm the Capitol of the country while Black and brown people are shot everyday for doing nothing. The tension and anger was palpable and rightly so. I was angry, but I can't imagine what watching those scenes play out would feel like to a Black person.

I spent the rest of the day watching the events unfold with the sweet, homeless, Black man I was sitting with. This man, who the system had failed at every single turn, was visibly upset by the scenes at the Capitol, but was in no way surprised. "That's how it always has been, white guys can do anything," he said to me, resigned to this reality. The day was tragically historic but witnessing these events first hand, through the eyes of this man gave me a different perspective and it was absolutely heartbreaking. I sat there for hours, heart racing, with a pit in my stomach as I braced for the situation to turn into a massacre. The terrorists were armed and actively trying to hunt down members of congress and the sitting Vice President. They were chanting "hang Mike Pence." They had erected gallows outside of the capital with a noose on it. They had zip ties, pepper spray, all sorts of guns and ammunition. They came ready for war. As bad as that day was, with an assault on democracy, encouraged and organized by the sitting President, it could have been so much worse.

As the weeks after the insurrection played out I think everyone in the United States lived with just a constant simmering fear that catastrophe could strike at any moment. Every possible horrible scenario was on the table. The sitting President, who had tried overturn a free and fair election by inciting an insurrection, still had access to the nuclear codes, retaining all the powers of the Presidency. There were talks of possibly invoking the 25th amendment, some talked about Trump possibly resigning, and somehow the thing that seemed to somewhat quiet the waters was the leader of the free world losing his Twitter and other social media privileges. What is this world? 

Impeachment in the House soon became inevitable and that process took a week to pull together, bringing us to Wednesday number two in January 2021. The kids are still only going to school on Monday and Tuesday which means they were home on all of these Wednesdays. As the Capitol was stormed, and I was sitting in a dark room with a stranger, my children were at home. Zach tried to balance letting them witness history, trying to prevent them from potentially watching people get shot on live television, and not letting them see too much where they would be terrified. The following Wednesday I was home, giving a brief lecture on how impeachment works, which I strangely know very well now since fifty percent of the impeachment proceedings in the history of the country have happened in the past year.  Never in my life did I think I would find myself at home with my children, who are doing virtual learning three days a week because of a global pandemic, trying to explain impeachment hearings, domestic terrorism, and insurrections to them. That's where I found myself the second Wednesday of this year. 

I would pop in to the news throughout the day to see how the arguments on the floor were going and to try to gauge when the final vote might be. The moment I turn on the television my children began spewing one hundred questions at me. What are they doing now?  Why would people wanted destroy the Capitol? Has this ever happened before? What is going to happen to the country?  Are we safe? Could that happen in Oklahoma? What happens next? If they impeach Trump will he not be President anymore? Why not? The questions about all the things have been non stop since the sixth. They are all the same questions the adults in the room have and no one has any answers. We ended the second Wednesday of the year with Trump having been impeached a second time, but also with the news that the Senate had no plans to come back to recess to deal with that until the nineteenth, the day before the inauguration.

Which leads me to yesterday, the third Wednesday of the month. I woke up yesterday singing For the First Time in Forever from the Frozen sound track. "They'll be actual real live people, it'll be totally strange. Wow, am I so ready for this change." "For the first time in forever they'll be music they'll be light!" I sang this song all morning. It's inauguration day!!!! This song, coupled with bringing doughnuts to Brendan for his fourteenth birthday in the morning, helped mask my underlying sense of dread that something terrible might happen during the inauguration. For instance one of the 25,000 National Guard Troops that were sent there to protect the ceremony starts shooting people, or God forbid a group of them turn on the crowd. The scenarios were endless, but I was clinging to joy. Even as the D.C. was completely empty, looking like an actual war zone with armed troops, eight foot tall medal walls with barbed wire on top of them set up around everything, I was clinging to hope.

I don't know if it was due to the fact that I've been peppered with non stop, unanswerable questions for the past month/year, or if I just really wanted to have uninterrupted joy, but for some reason my children's questions seemed particularly asinine yesterday. Here are some exchanges I had with my children yesterday. Bear in mind we have talked about this for WEEKS. We watched videos of various previous inaugurations, ranging from both of Obama's to JFK and beyond. I've gone through step by step what will happen that day REPEATEDLY. We've read books, looked at pictures, watched news stories and YouTube videos. They were not going into this blind, and yet here are just a few of the questions I got. 

Rowan: Mom, so Michelle Obama is going to sing the National Anthem?

Me: Yep, absolutely, definitely not Lady Gaga who you've been talking about singing at the Inauguration for week. They've gone with Michelle because her outfit is so on point. (But seriously that OUTFIT!)

Zane: So is that giant flag in front of the Capitol a cake?

Me: Yes, they eat it after they are sworn in. It's the size of a football field, but sure. 

Kids: So what building is that?

Me: The one with the dome? The one that we've talked about literally everyday for weeks? That's the Capitol.

Kids: Oh, what happens there?

Me: head explosion

On and on and on it went. Why is no one there? Why are so many people there? What side of the White House is the West Wing on? Why are their flags? Why is today historic? Why does Tom Hanks not look like Sheriff Woody. OH MY HOLY GOD, STOP!!! I'm pretty sure at one point Rowan asked me who Joe Biden was when he was on the screen. By the end of the day I had decided that they were low key screwing with me. Zach worked late and as soon as he walked in the door at six thirty I told the children all questions must be directed to dad for the rest of the night because I just couldn't answer one more thing, God love them. 

With the constant, non stop questioning aside it truly a wonderful, historic day that I'm so glad they got to witness and be a part of, even if they were driving me crazy. I bawled through the entire thing, from the moment Kamala Harris stepped out of her motorcade right through that amazingly beautiful poem by Amanda Gorman. I warned my children this was going to happen. I specifically told Rowan, my little feeling, "I will be crying all day. Barring something unforeseen happening the tears will all be happy tears. Do not panic. I am fine!" And yet every time I teared up here came Rowan, all over my body, hands all over my face, "What's wrong mom? Why are you sad? Stop crying." JUST LET ME ENJOY THIS MOMENT!!!!!! Please!

There were tears for every little girl who was witnessing history and every little girl who won't remember a time when there hadn't been a woman in the executive branch. Tears thinking about all the women who came before her, the shoulders she stood on. And of course tears of relief at seeing a president act like a president again, show compassion, empathy, and speak of unity not division. There is something to be about having a leader who has personally experienced tragedy. Joe Biden has a level of empathy only those who have truly felt loss can have. I think it will serve him, and the country so well during this tragic time. 

The mundane, normal, political things like a White House press briefing brought me to tears yesterday. There were also some very strange, eerie vibes during everything yesterday. All the streets were empty, and everyone, including all the marching military and troops guarding everything were masked. We've grown accustom to the look of everyone being masked, but when I took a step back for a minute, that was one of the most striking things. There is usually a parade that goes by the viewing stand at the White House in the evening, but this year there were just military marching down the streets, in their dress uniforms, but still a strange scene for sure. There was a virtual concern at the end of the day, which had a very 2020 vibe to it, mostly prerecorded performances from around the country, like a huge zoom call with America. Mainly I just cannot imagine what an inauguration in front of a completely empty mall must have felt like. Everything was different, but this was the first inauguration my children will remember which also seemed sad and strange all at once.

 At the end of the day it felt like maybe now healing can begin. I know we have so much to overcome, but that feeling of hope, even a sliver of it, felt amazing after years of fearing what news I would wake up to in the morning. Here is to hope, and praying next Wednesday is a terribly boring, uneventful day.

I saw this online somewhere today and it was too good not to screen shot. This sums it up.

COVID Vaccine

 For the past ten months I have lived with a constant fear that I might die from this virus that has over taken us. When I tell people this they frequently laugh it off or tell me that I'm being dramatic or pessimistic. "Oh Audra you'd be fine if you got it." They say dismissing these concerns as impossible. This is beyond infuriating to me because we're fast approaching half a million people in this country who have died from this virus. I'm sure a large majority of them said the exact some thing before they got sick, "I'd be fine if it I got it. It's just like the flu. It's not that big of a deal. I'm young and healthy," and on and on. So many people who thought that and said that are no longer with us. I have outgrown the thought that the worst case scenario can't happen to me or my loved ones. And this is why, through the past ten months, there has been a constant fear and stress about me, or someone I love, dying from this terrible disease.

For the majority of that time I didn't know what the light at the end of the tunnel would look like. I couldn't imagine a vaccine being available this quickly, so the thought of a vaccine being that light never really crossed my mind. I had assumed that it would take years to make an effective vaccine. So when rumors of vaccines becoming widely available started popping up in mid November I was fully surprised. My initial thought, like so many people, was "how could this possibly be safe, they have only had nine months to work on it." There was also the political aspect to it initially, questioning if President Trump had any hand in releasing a vaccine before the election so he'd get credit for it, in which case could we trust that it was real. As the news stories kept coming out I caught myself reading snippets of headlines and then making assumptions without actually reading any of the actual science. As a person with two science based degrees I know better than this, but also that's what social media has conditioned us to do, read the shocking headline, make up a story, move on.

As a medical professional I thought it was my job to learn the actual facts and science on this vaccine. I sat down one day, pencil in hand, because I learned long ago that I cannot learn anything without writing it down. I read the studies and I watched videos of actual scientists explaining the science behind the vaccine. All the things I had learned, repeatedly, about DNA, RNA, mRNA, ribosomes, and the parts of a cell came back to me. I was reassured that they scientific community had been working on the mRNA technology for over a decade and that they'd also worked with other variants of the corona virus when they dealt with things like SARs in the past. They were quickly able to see the differences and with the flood of money, technology, and the around the clock efforts of scientists around the world, they were able to make this vaccine in record time and with extremely high, ninety five percent, efficacy. I will spare all the details here but suffice it to say after my research it appears to be groundbreaking, unbelievably safe technology that I can see being used in all sorts of various fields in medicine.

On December 15th, 2020 the first person in the United States received the Pzifer COVID 19 vaccine. On December 17th I received my first dose. I cannot put into words the feeling of being one of the first people, in the world, to receive a ground breaking, new vaccine, in the middle of a global pandemic. It's a situation not very  many people will find themselves in during their lives. After my research I didn't have any trepidations about the shot being safe, but it still is a weird feeling, being a part of such a historic, strange time. I got my first shot around eleven o'clock in the morning. I had a headache and starting feeling generally kind of grouse around one o'clock in the afternoon and that lasted the rest of that day. I felt fatigued, occasionally felt like I might have a fever, but mainly just a splitting headache. Upon returning home from getting my shot I immediately sliced my finger open and my children were insane, so I wasn't sure my symptoms were completely due to the shot and just from my life being crazy. For a few days after the shot my arm did hurt quite a bit, more than a flu shot, but nothing too terrible.

The research has shown that the first shot is about fifty percent efficacy so a second shot is required to get to the ninety five percent efficacy. This is common with vaccines. The Hepatitis B vaccine is two shots, the MMR is multiple shots, and there are all sorts of other shots that need booster shots years down the road as well. I feel like research might show that to be the case for this vaccine in the future. Three weeks later on Thursday January  7th, 2021, I got my second vaccine. I got it around noon and by one o'clock and I had a headache and quickly began feeling fully miserable. For the rest of that day I had a splitting headache, fever, chills, and no energy. The following day I woke up with terrible body aches, no energy at all, headache, and I had chills on and off. I did nothing that entire day. I was fully wiped out, but couldn't really sleep because my body hurt everywhere, and I couldn't get comfortable. I was supposed to work on Saturday but called in Friday night when I was still fully miserable. I did feel somewhat better Saturday, but still had no energy and a splitting headache. By Saturday evening I started to begin to feel like myself again.

I thought my We Can Do Hard Things shirt was fitting. We have done so many hard things, this one seemed incredibly easy.

The whole time I kind of felt like Spiderman when he gets bitten by the radio active spider and then transforms over night into having super powers. It was nothing like I had experienced before. I felt sick, but at the same time so hopeful that my immune system was at working, making antibiotics, to protect me from this thing that I've feared for almost a year. For the first time during this entire pandemic experience I felt like I was actively doing something to ease some of my fears and anxiety. It's a weird mind meld feeling sick but also feeling like you're  getting stronger all at once. I laid around and just let my body do it's thing. I know we have so much farther to go. It's going to take time to get the masses vaccinated and then we have to pray it works as well as research has shown it should. This all only works and makes things better if people actually take the shot. I don't know how things turn around and begin to feel somewhat normal again, but this definitely felt like a first step.

Through it all I have been acutely aware that I'm living through a very historic moment. Prior to going to get my first shot I called my ninety five year old Grandfather, who is a doctor. He was excited to hear that I was going to be one of the first ones to get the shot. I asked him if there were people who refused to take other groundbreaking, pandemic ending, vaccines when they came out or if everyone just got on board. Being ninety five years old he's witnessed the eradication of multiple terrible diseases, polio and mumps being the two main ones he talked about. "Well there were always people who refused to take them initially, but they usually would come around, or they'd die," he'd said with a chuckle. He said, "We'll sure know a lot more about it once we're on the other side of this won't we." I stand in awe of the life he's lived, the things he's seen, the science he's witnessed. Can you even imagine? Of course in true Grandpa Dotter fashion he is declining to get his vaccine until everyone else in town gets theirs first. His reasoning is that the people who have to go to work and be out in the community need to have theirs before he does, since he's perfectly happy to never leave the house.

We're now in phase two here in Oklahoma. Phase two is being split into two different levels, the first level being people over sixty five years of age and other health care workers and first responders. Mom was able to get her first shot a couple weeks ago, which was also a huge relief to me. The second level of phase two, as I understand it should include teachers, who have be just lead to slaughter in all of this. All but one of the specials teachers at Rowan's school have had it and one is currently two or three weeks into a hospital stay for it. They see every student in the school each day, and children are being sent to school while their parents are home sick with covid because their kids feel fine. Then those kids are exposing the teachers. Zach qualifies for phase three somehow, based on companies he works with or sights he tours, and then phase four will be open to everyone. I am hopeful that with a new presidential administration that some of the slow processes around the vaccine roll out will be fixed and wider distribution will be available soon.

Currently we are still not doing much of anything outside of the house. The boys go to school and Zach occasionally goes into work when he absolutely has to. The boys went to Alice's birthday party with just our family this weekend, wearing masks and trying to stay outside. We are going to go to the Pinewood Derby next weekend, but otherwise our families rule currently is no activities until all adults involved have been vaccinated. As I write this Oklahoma ranks fourth in the world for number of cases per one hundred thousand people. Fourth worst in the world is no joke, that means someone in every room has it at this point, whether they know it or not. We've come so far, sacrificed so much, I just can't fathom getting this close to a vaccine and screwing it up now. Hang in there everyone, we are so close!!!!

Christmas 2020

Well what can I say besides Christmas 2020 was definitely not like any other Christmas. The boys did virtual school for the first two weeks of December, before winter break, so we were home, as a family for the entire month. This made our Christmas season, though very different, feel like it was a month long, cozy, family celebration. 

Every tradition was different, with the main thing missing were the big family gathers, opening presents, sharing a meal, sitting around snacking and chatting. These big, day long, fun family events were instead replaced with driveway present openings. Mom brought the kids presents throughout the month which was actually loads of fun for them as they got something new about once a week all December. In an attempt to get in the Christmas spirit we got dressed up in our most festive attire for our driveway present exchange at the Richard's house.

The normal cousin picture looks very 2020 with our masks, pajama pants, and all outside.

Here's our festive driveway Christmas family photo. Yep I'm in sweat pants and my ugly Christmas sweater that I bought last year for Christmas and never got to wear because Zane was sick the day of the Cub Scout Christmas party last year.

Something that I always want to do during December, but never have time for, is to go drive through one of the big light displays in the state. There are always so many things happening and school to get up for in the morning that it just never happens. However, in 2020 we had nothing but time. We could leave early since Zach was working from home and we had an hour to sit and wait to drive through the Yukon lights. We got hot chocolate, brought snacks, and everyone had a lovely time, minus Rowan who complained the entire time we waited, as though he had something else to be doing at home.

It was frigid and super windy this night, but we braved the elements to run through the light tunnel and take a few pictures to remember the evening. It was a very strange feeling once you got out of the car. You could hear parents telling their children, "keep your mask on," "keep your distance." These are phrases that weren't in our vocabulary a year ago and now they are a common parenting refrain.

Gary had another wonderful stay at our house this year. Zane got to be in on the fun which I think he equal parts enjoyed and made him sad. He did have fun moving him around without Rowan and Thatcher knowing, but there were times when it was just Zane and I when he told me, "I'm sad that I know about Santa." So in an attempt to help him embrace his new elf status Gary brought him the elf onsie he's been wanting for years. 

This was Christmas Eve morning, he brought new pajamas for everyone.

This elf will probably be taller than me next year.

Christmas Eve I think was the hardest day for me, of all the hard, sad days over this holiday season. Christmas Eve might be my favorite day of the year. It's the culmination of all the excitement and preparation and the day ends with such anticipation. Also, usually the day ends with everyone dressed up in matching Christmas sweaters, jammed into pews at church, singing Christmas carols, hearing the Christmas story, and experiencing the same mass I have experienced every Christmas Eve since I was an itty bitty child. It reminds me of Christmas Eve's growing up, it makes me think of dad, it's all my favorite parts of Christmas. So this year I was kind of dreading Christmas Eve without this big event. 

Here's what we did instead. We started the day with emails from Santa. This was the first year that Thatcher understood the idea of Santa and he was enthralled with his email from Santa. I took a video of him watching it, but don't know how to make that upload. Everyone was on the nice list!

Look at this face!

Then we made cookies for Santa, again the first year that Thatcher was very excited that Santa would be eating his cookies. This is always a staple of our Christmas Eve fun. Somehow cut out cookies didn't seem like such a big deal after our year of extensive baking, but it was still fun.

In the afternoon we took a walk to bring a neighbor something they  needed for their Christmas cookies. Zane went dressed as Elf, bringing joy and laughs to everyone out for a Christmas Eve walk. Zane embodies all that is Elf. Everytime I watch that movie I say, he is elf. He's pure joy, he always has the best attitude towards everything, he makes everything fun, and is easily distracted. I thought the Elf costume suited him so well and most importantly it made him so happy.

Then it came to the hard part of the day. The time when we'd all be getting dressing and ready for church. We decided to have our big Christmas meal on Christmas Eve. We made just the things we actually wanted to eat, ham, mashed potatoes, green beans with crunchy onions, and bread. We lit our Advent candles and read the Christmas story around the dinner table, just us.

Then there was nothing left to do but get in our cozy jammies and watch a movie. After much debate the boys landed on Home Alone, which is not a movie I grew up with, so it read a book while they enjoyed the movie. Of course we had to have our yearly photo shoot in front of the Christmas tree first.

Here we are, we made it to Christmas. My cozy jammies are much tighter than I would like, after months of eating all the things. My boys are so much bigger than last year and in this picture I can't help but think of all we've been through since last Christmas, but we made it.

After movie night it was time for tearful good byes to Gary as we set out cookies for Santa.

Everything was set out and ready by 8:30pm. Usually they stay up much later on Christmas Eve, but I feel like everyone was ready to go to bed so Santa could come this year.

Santa's Cookies

Once the boys went to bed it was time for Zach and I's yearly tradition of watching It's a Wonderful Life and putting together Christmas presents. This year there was a punching bag and a scooter to put together, but mainly we just watched the movie. I stayed awake for the whole thing this year. Then Santa came and it was time for bed.

Christmas morning was all the things Christmas morning always is. It was full of excitiment, joy, surprise, and all the wonderful Christmas things. Everyone got all the things they wanted and things they didn't even know they wanted.

This is the avacodo growing kit that I got for Zach after his months long attempt of growing an avacodo tree from a pit that ended terribly this seemed like the perfect gift for him.

Thatcher's one request from Santa was a chainsaw and Santa delivered.

Upon further thought Santa might have been crazy for getting Rowan, Mr. Broken Arm, roller skates, but he's enjoyed them.

Zane had been missing being able to scooter with his brother since he outgrew the child size scooter. This is an adult scooter that seems to be working nicely so far.

Thatcher also got a leave blower from one of Zach's sister's and he loves all his knew power tools.

Funny story about the baseball jerseys. The boys peer pressured me into buying them these custom made jerseys with Korenak on the back a few months ago when they were on sale. It took them forever to arrive so my plan was to wrap them up for Christmas. Christmas afternoon the boys asked if the jerseys had never come because they thought they were getting them for Christmas. Turns out I had hid them too well and they ended up just getting them thrown at them randomly in the middle of the day, after I finally found them in my closet. They were a big hit!

We spent the day doing absolutely nothing. We watched movies, played the various board games they got, had a fire outside, and the boys rode their new toys. I read a book, tried to nap, ate all kinds of candies and treats, and stayed in pajamas all day. We had a cheese ball around the time we would normally be eating cheese ball and hanging out at Abbey's house, turns out her family was doing the same thing. It was another slow, normal, lazy, do nothing day after a year of slow, do nothing, lazy days that year. No one complained about it, having grown accustomed to never doing anything and all their plans being cancelled. Everyone was a little sad and we all missed our normal family fun, but it was a good day.

I honestly don't even know what we did for the following few days between Christmas and New Years. We usually head to Zach's parent's house a few days after Christmas, but we couldn't do that this year. So instead we stayed home and we ate a lot, we watched a lot of TV, and we played way too many vidoe games. Zach was working from home so we were all there playing with new toys and doing nothing. The kids wanted to stay up for the ball drop and this year seemed like the year to usher the old meal out and welcome the new one in. We got all our normal New Year's Eve treats and snacks and continued our movie watching trend. Full discloser I fell asleep which was lovely.

We got a Family Adventure Challenge book for Christmas and our first surprise adventure was to make a family crest/flag. We did this one evening before the new year. It turned about pretty amazing.

Thatcher's addition was frogs!

Finished product complete with the STL Arch, a penguin, a hammerhead shark, a snack, a scooter, baseball things, and all our letters.

We woke up to a New Year covered in a blanket of fluffy snow. It felt like a perfect way to start a new year. I am under no illusion that 2021 will be magically better than 2020. The first few weeks of the year have proven already that that isn't going to be the case. But there was something very peaceful and hopeful about starting the year covered in clean white snow. It felt almost like a cleansing of the past.

And with that the holiday season was over and we started a new year. The boys went back to school on January 4th. They are still on the AABB schedule so they are still just going two days a week. I don't know if that's the right choice, what with the numbers being so high, but here we are. As of the 7th I am fully vaccinated, which is a whole other story, but that gives us a little more piece of mind. The world still feels like it's on fire and everything is falling apart. I still don't know how to explain any of it to my children. My job is still insane and I think about having to quit frequently. It is a new year that feels very much the same, but praying there is hope ahead.