Day Seventy: New Shelves, A Walk, A Canoe, and Sushi
Seventy days is a lot of days. Ten weeks. Three and a half fortnights. Day Seventy was rainy in the morning and evening with a hot, sunny, muggy afternoon in between.
Jeremy built two shelves for mugs in the kitchen, and I spent a satisfying hour or so rearranging things in the kitchen, organizing my mug collection and coffee and tea paraphernalia. For lunch, I repurposed last night's dinner of beans and pasta and made a simple soup with pesto dolloped on top. Taiya and I played board games for while: Hoot Owl Hoot, Count Your Chickens, and two different versions of Memory. Then Taiya and William had a long round of "pretend" which left most of my afternoon free to think my own thoughts as I went about my day.
In the late afternoon, Jeremy drove the kids to the farm and I followed on foot with Daisy so we could both get our exercise. He took his fishing pole and they went to the big pond. They paddled in the canoe and caught tiny perch. It definitely felt summery at around 80 degrees and muggy. There were dark clouds on the horizon and low thunder rumbling in the distance. After some time at the pond, the thunder was getting closer so we loaded up in the farm truck to do chores quickly. We didn't quite make it in time, though. Before we even got to the goat pen the rain started pouring down. We all ended up soaked, but the kids thought it was a riot so spirits remained high.
When we got home, Taiya wanted to watch Maleficent, a movie too scary for William, so she snuggled up on the couch and had a matinee while William watched Wild Kratts upstairs. Jeremy disappeared to his man cave in the yurt to catch up on the news and probably to smoke his pipe (he's cut way back, but still hasn't quit entirely yet). I made the kids popcorn and hot cocoa, then started on dinner. I made sushi, this time with a sauteed shiitake from one of our shiitake logs (they haven't been producing much, but we get one or two on occasion) in one roll and a scrambled egg in another roll, both with shredded carrots and bell pepper. Having sushi for dinner feels like such an extravagance, but it really isn't that hard. I made "snack dinner" for the kids, which is just cheese, salami, fresh veggies, hummus, crackers, and in this case, some leftover sushi rice. They are not interested in sushi themselves.
In this way, Day Seventy rolled by smoothly, with plenty of fun.
I've been pondering the changes in my life during this pandemic time. I've stopped driving 100 miles a day round-trip to work, for one. This is 500 miles a week of driving I'm not doing. Over 10 weeks that's at least 5,000 miles of driving I haven't done. I drive a Prius which averages 48 mpg, but to make the math easy, let's say I get 50 mpg. That means I've saved more than 100 gallons of gas and have eliminated the need for one oil change.
My garden hasn't been super productive yet, so I can't brag about how much food I've grown yet (though I plan to) as a result of being at home more. I also can't brag about getting more exercise than before either, since I still spend so much time at my computer, and in the house keeping everyone fed. But boy have I spent more time with my children than ever before. It has reminded me of being on maternity leave. I remember being home with Taiya, just one child, and a baby who napped really well. And I still wondered why I couldn't get anything done! The dishes would be piled up, laundry was limited to her cloth diapers, dinner wouldn't get done, and what did I do all day? I spent most of it nursing, diapering, staring at her little face, getting her to sleep, sleeping myself, etc. The day would go by and I wouldn't "get anything done," except for, you know, bonding with, caring for, and sustaining the life of one sweet little girl while recovering from pregnancy and delivery. Being home with the kids now, I'm still spending a huge amount of energy feeding them, snuggling with them, reading to them, breaking up their fights, playing with them, teaching them, saving them from the jaws of Daisy the Nipper, on and on. I guess that's "getting things done." The problem is, it's never done. I never get to check that box on my to do list and move on to something more visible and permanent, like tiling my back splash, or building hugelkulture gardens. I'm doing things all day long, they're just never done and are regularly undone. It provides plenty of opportunity to embrace impermanence and practice patience. Thank goodness for my Buddhist upbringing.
Another pandemic-related change has been to my recycling efforts. Since I don't go to Fayetteville every day where I can drop my recycling off, I said in an earlier blog post that I would stop recycling for now. But I couldn't bring myself to stop. I compromised and throw away paper and plastic, saving just glass, steel, and aluminum. Even this change has doubled the amount of trash we create each week. If I had more energy to devote to this problem I would be looking seriously at product packaging and how we could change our purchasing habits to low waste choices. But, honestly, I don't have the energy to push it much farther right now. Someday, maybe, I'll be forced to only buy flour in paper sacks and make my own everything, but until then, I'm buying the damn triscuits.
One last change I wanted to highlight is my writing. I've been writing for this blog nearly every day (last week being a notable exception) for seventy days. This has felt so good for my writing muscles. The rest of my body may be atrophying but my ability to eliminate excess commas is getting better. I hope. Dad, you can correct me on this if I'm wrong. (-: But commas aside, I don't know if I've ever written this much this consistently. I have been working on my poetry behind the scenes as well, and I find myself spending my days thinking, "How would I describe this?" Or "Remember this!" Counting the dots on the wings of the butterfly that landed on my hand while drinking tea on the porch so I could properly identify it in my blog (seven, but I'm still working on an ID. I think it might have been a northern pearly-eye, but I'm not 100% sure). The act of writing so regularly has made me pay more attention to everything. It's a wonderful mindfulness exercise that has helped in this home bound time.
Thank you for joining me on this adventure. Let's see what the next seventy days bring, shall we? With around 100,000 deaths in the U.S. due to COVID-19 to date, I am grateful that my seventy days have been spent so peacefully and safely, and I am so sad that such vast numbers of people are suffering. It still doesn't feel real a lot of the time, but we are committed to remaining strictly socially distanced to play our small part in keeping the virus from spreading. I am excited to get to return to the pleasures of life B.C. like going to the library, the farmer's market, lunch at the Indian food buffet with a friend, family get-togethers for holidays, farmer workshops, play dates. But those things can wait. They will all be there whenever this is over. And when it is safe to see you all again I'm going to hug you hard and talk your ears right off.
Jeremy built two shelves for mugs in the kitchen, and I spent a satisfying hour or so rearranging things in the kitchen, organizing my mug collection and coffee and tea paraphernalia. For lunch, I repurposed last night's dinner of beans and pasta and made a simple soup with pesto dolloped on top. Taiya and I played board games for while: Hoot Owl Hoot, Count Your Chickens, and two different versions of Memory. Then Taiya and William had a long round of "pretend" which left most of my afternoon free to think my own thoughts as I went about my day.
In the late afternoon, Jeremy drove the kids to the farm and I followed on foot with Daisy so we could both get our exercise. He took his fishing pole and they went to the big pond. They paddled in the canoe and caught tiny perch. It definitely felt summery at around 80 degrees and muggy. There were dark clouds on the horizon and low thunder rumbling in the distance. After some time at the pond, the thunder was getting closer so we loaded up in the farm truck to do chores quickly. We didn't quite make it in time, though. Before we even got to the goat pen the rain started pouring down. We all ended up soaked, but the kids thought it was a riot so spirits remained high.
In this way, Day Seventy rolled by smoothly, with plenty of fun.
I've been pondering the changes in my life during this pandemic time. I've stopped driving 100 miles a day round-trip to work, for one. This is 500 miles a week of driving I'm not doing. Over 10 weeks that's at least 5,000 miles of driving I haven't done. I drive a Prius which averages 48 mpg, but to make the math easy, let's say I get 50 mpg. That means I've saved more than 100 gallons of gas and have eliminated the need for one oil change.
My garden hasn't been super productive yet, so I can't brag about how much food I've grown yet (though I plan to) as a result of being at home more. I also can't brag about getting more exercise than before either, since I still spend so much time at my computer, and in the house keeping everyone fed. But boy have I spent more time with my children than ever before. It has reminded me of being on maternity leave. I remember being home with Taiya, just one child, and a baby who napped really well. And I still wondered why I couldn't get anything done! The dishes would be piled up, laundry was limited to her cloth diapers, dinner wouldn't get done, and what did I do all day? I spent most of it nursing, diapering, staring at her little face, getting her to sleep, sleeping myself, etc. The day would go by and I wouldn't "get anything done," except for, you know, bonding with, caring for, and sustaining the life of one sweet little girl while recovering from pregnancy and delivery. Being home with the kids now, I'm still spending a huge amount of energy feeding them, snuggling with them, reading to them, breaking up their fights, playing with them, teaching them, saving them from the jaws of Daisy the Nipper, on and on. I guess that's "getting things done." The problem is, it's never done. I never get to check that box on my to do list and move on to something more visible and permanent, like tiling my back splash, or building hugelkulture gardens. I'm doing things all day long, they're just never done and are regularly undone. It provides plenty of opportunity to embrace impermanence and practice patience. Thank goodness for my Buddhist upbringing.
Another pandemic-related change has been to my recycling efforts. Since I don't go to Fayetteville every day where I can drop my recycling off, I said in an earlier blog post that I would stop recycling for now. But I couldn't bring myself to stop. I compromised and throw away paper and plastic, saving just glass, steel, and aluminum. Even this change has doubled the amount of trash we create each week. If I had more energy to devote to this problem I would be looking seriously at product packaging and how we could change our purchasing habits to low waste choices. But, honestly, I don't have the energy to push it much farther right now. Someday, maybe, I'll be forced to only buy flour in paper sacks and make my own everything, but until then, I'm buying the damn triscuits.
One last change I wanted to highlight is my writing. I've been writing for this blog nearly every day (last week being a notable exception) for seventy days. This has felt so good for my writing muscles. The rest of my body may be atrophying but my ability to eliminate excess commas is getting better. I hope. Dad, you can correct me on this if I'm wrong. (-: But commas aside, I don't know if I've ever written this much this consistently. I have been working on my poetry behind the scenes as well, and I find myself spending my days thinking, "How would I describe this?" Or "Remember this!" Counting the dots on the wings of the butterfly that landed on my hand while drinking tea on the porch so I could properly identify it in my blog (seven, but I'm still working on an ID. I think it might have been a northern pearly-eye, but I'm not 100% sure). The act of writing so regularly has made me pay more attention to everything. It's a wonderful mindfulness exercise that has helped in this home bound time.
Thank you for joining me on this adventure. Let's see what the next seventy days bring, shall we? With around 100,000 deaths in the U.S. due to COVID-19 to date, I am grateful that my seventy days have been spent so peacefully and safely, and I am so sad that such vast numbers of people are suffering. It still doesn't feel real a lot of the time, but we are committed to remaining strictly socially distanced to play our small part in keeping the virus from spreading. I am excited to get to return to the pleasures of life B.C. like going to the library, the farmer's market, lunch at the Indian food buffet with a friend, family get-togethers for holidays, farmer workshops, play dates. But those things can wait. They will all be there whenever this is over. And when it is safe to see you all again I'm going to hug you hard and talk your ears right off.
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