I have more time and inclination to blog these days, and I think it will be interesting to keep track of these days as much as I am able, given how odd this cultural experience is.
I’m sipping Genmaicha, a looseleaf tea made with green leaves and burnt crispy rice pods, and trying to decide if I like it or not. The boys are in their sleeping bags on the floor watching Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief – our first Family Fun night event. This is not fun at all – Liam and Jack have both read the book more than once and they are INCENSED at every tiny difference in the movie. They are talking all the way through. “Annabeth is supposed to have blond hair and grey eyes, not blue eyes and brown hair!” “That is NOT what really happened to Mrs. Dodds!” “That’s not supposed to be an arch, it’s a tree!!” It is most tiresome, but they are enjoying themselves in a way, so I am trying to leave them to it.
Today we followed our Saturday schedule. Morning relaxing – the boys played on their screens while I ate delicious poached eggs served by my husband and wrote the first blog post of the day. At 10ish, I called the boys down for our morning screen-free activity – in this case, to help me plant our containers, which Liam and Craig did in very chipper and helpful fashion. Jack turned into Sulky Tween, and refused to participate, so he went in the house and played with a Nerf gun and hollered sulkly tweeny attention seeking things out at us, which I ignored. The littler boys stuck with me, though, and we got all our stuff potted and looking great.
After we played in dirt for a few hours, we all got showers and then had lunch. After lunch was an hour of quiet time – Liam and I grabbed our books and sat on the back porch to read. Craig, of his own volition, got up and made everyone snacks, inappropriately massive bowls of Goldfish which he carted around the house delivering to each of us. He then dragged a couple of chairs out on the back porch and climbed all over them, bugging the heck out of me while I was trying to read, but at least following the no-screen rules.
After a quiet hour, it was screenless play time. The Prof played a board game with the two little boys, and I took Jack to a friend’s house for Dungeons and Dragons, which he plays through church youth group. Youth group, and church, and all church sponsored events have been canceled through April 5, in accordance with the state mandate. However, the church decided that tweens and young teens are at least risk, so they can still meet in small groups outside church as long as no one is exhibiting symptoms or has had contact with anyone who is ill. I did some online reading and agreed that this was minimal risk, so I drove him to a friend’s house where he met with three other kids and played for a couple of hours. This reduced some of the Tween Angst. We also talked at some length on the drive about whether perhaps we were feeling some Feelings Of Uncertainty about the pandemic and school closures and things, and if perhaps we wanted to talk about our Feelings rather than be a jerk during morning activities. I’m not sure if it was that or the social time that helped him turn the corner, but after D&D was over he was much perkier and less “Everything is STUPID” all the time.
They had individual screens from 4-6, and then we all had dinner and I asked them what family fun activity they wanted to do before bed. Percy Jackson won, and so now Craig is watching Medusa through the cracks of his fingers and Liam is squirming and squealing with pre-adolescent discomfort every time Percy and Annabeth look with longing at each other.
In conclusion: Day One Report
Liam wins Best Son today. He was enthusiastic about everything, followed the structure of the schedule seamlessly, suggested fun activities, and basically served as Assistant Cruise Director. Jack was our weakest link, but it’s not usual for him to be quite so angsty so I’m hopeful his feelings will smooth out over the next few days. Craig was cute as a button and annoying as all hell, but in a sweet enthusiastic way (observing the hydra just now, he said with a furrowed brow “What is this? A snake slash dragon? A Sndragon?”) Overall, all three of them make FAR too many fake-fight-sound-effect noises with their mouths, and the dog has lost his fool mind and barks at everything, but we had a good first day of social distancing/family togetherness.
And I think I’ve decided that I don’t really like this burnt sticky rice tea.
This is going to be a long haul.
*heavy sigh