I am weepy because I got an email from Target saying items I ordered YESTERDAY will arrive THIS MORNING already, and one of the items was something someone should have put on the list before my last grocery store trip but didn’t, and I went to the store recently and am not going back for awhile, so I was feeling some despair about how can I keep the house stocked during a pandemic IF PEOPLE CAN’T EVEN BE BOTHERED TO PUT THINGS ON THE LIST, and now I am feeling so GRATEFUL to online stores, and to warehouse workers, and to delivery workers, and *WEEP*. So clearly the emotional fragility continues.

Shopping is one of my coping methods, and another recent example of this is that I impulsively ordered a whole lot of notebooks and folders, even though I don’t know if the kids will even need them or use them. Mostly it seems like school supplies are for carrying information back and forth between home and classroom, but also they’re for keeping things organized, and if I were doing classes online I would still want to have a separate notebook for each class, and ideally a folder to match that notebook, and so forth, and buying school supplies is so fun and I’m sad at the thought of missing it, and also I was worried about things selling out and this is not really the year for going from store to store, and so I placed the order.

The three younger kids were all in bed (these days they go to bed about when I do, but I was up late because I couldn’t sleep) so I couldn’t ask them what colors they wanted as I usually would, so I just got two each of every color and we’ll let them cage-match it out: there’s a certain fun in choosing your own stuff, but there’s another kind of fun in figuring out how to divide pre-chosen stuff. Normally I would buy Mead notebooks and folders in hopes of higher durability, but this year I got the store brand of both. These supplies don’t have to survive being shoved into a backpack/locker every day, and I don’t even know if we’ll USE them, so I went cheap: paper-cover notebooks, vinyl cover notebooks; and folders (on clearance!) with and without binder holes (we still have some serviceable binders from last year).

We don’t really need anything else, I don’t think. Normally I want/need to buy more pencils and pens, but we have tons. Normally I would buy new erasers and new pencil cases and new highlighters and basically new anything that seemed fun or was on the teachers’ lists, but this year I don’t have that impulse.

One of the interesting things about my boring blog-fixing project is seeing how very predictable I am with my mood slumps. I work on a month’s worth of posts in a day, generally, and it seems like in every batch there is just ALWAYS at least one post about how low I feel and what I’m doing about it with food and exercise and moping and shopping.

I am in another low time now, and I am coping by re-reading Maeve Binchy books, buying too many kinds of tea, eating extra vegetables and extra treats, buying extra non-perishables, and openly weeping while listening to Michelle Obama’s podcast on walks.

Our school district has taken a step in the direction of rejecting the hybrid option (which, as commenter Liz aptly put it, was actually “a 40-page document explaining why they just can not open at all”). They haven’t come to the final decision yet, but my feeling is that one way or another we are going to be going remote: either from the beginning, or after we try the hybrid option and a lot of people get sick and we have to shut it down.

But apparently first we are going to do the intermediate step of making sure teachers and other school employees know how little we care about them and their families, and to what extent we consider them daycare workers rather than educators, and how entitled we feel to that daycare, and how entitled we feel to normality even when normality is not currently an option. Some parents are threatening to sue the school district, the principals, the school board, the teachers themselves. One parent said that in her opinion teachers and other school employees should feel grateful to still have their jobs when so many people are out of work, and another parent responded that they didn’t see why teachers and school employees should get to stay home when other people have to work, and that was when I gave up on having a happy life.

Considering ALL the options are terrible and there is NO good option where things are normal and there’s no pandemic and everyone keeps their jobs, then surely choosing the option where we turn this whole thing against teachers/schools is our worst and most short-sighted idea yet; and it won’t even WORK. We will lose some of the teachers and other school employees at the very start, as they quit in the face of parents/administrators insisting they go back when it’s not safe; this alone may be enough to leave the school too understaffed to open. But if, after the first wave of quitting, we still have enough staff to open, we will lose more teachers/employees shortly afterward, as they get sick and/or die, or else quit from the stress; at that point, the school will certainly be too understaffed to remain open, and possibly now too understaffed to do effective remote learning. We will have pushed pushed pushed to get schools to open, and it will result in schools being closed anyway soon afterward—but only after losing people we didn’t have to lose, and traumatizing/demoralizing the rest, and leaving the whole school system worse off than it was before.

I had a low day yesterday, and then had trouble getting to sleep even though I took benadryl, and then at 2:00 in the morning my phone rang and that is just never going to be good news. And I could see on the screen that the caller was my eldest son, which was weird; this happened once before, though, when he’d gone outside to get something out of the car and locked himself out. But when I answered, he didn’t say anything, which gave me visions of him badly hurt (calling me RIGHT BEFORE LOSING CONSCIOUSNESS!!) and/or kidnapped somehow. But no: butt-dial. Time it took for me to get back to sleep after this drama: roughly 1 hour 45 minutes.

I have what I find to be a pleasing though boring update on my fretty dentist situation. That post is just a giant tangled ball of stress, so I suggest NOT clicking the link, and instead I will summarize the relevant part by saying I’d canceled Edward and Henry’s routine dentist appointments, then regretted it because Henry has braces and it really seemed as if he ought to have a cleaning, especially since the DAY I canceled the appointment we got a pre-appointment letter from the dentist that made it sound really really safe. And anyway it made me feel as if every decision I make is wrong, and I’d continued to fret about it, but felt too sheepish to call the dentist and ask for a new appointment for Henry. Then I saw Elizabeth’s routine cleaning coming up on the calendar, and I called the dentist office and asked if it would be possible to give Henry that appointment instead of Elizabeth (I’d been planning to just cancel it), and they said yes, so now the kid with braces will get his cleaning, and I feel better.

A friend brought to my attention that kids 18 and older have to sign HIPAA authorizations and possibly medical power of attorney forms, or else their parents can’t have access to their information or make medical decisions for them if they’re incapacitated. That seems…rather crucial, in a pandemic or even not in a pandemic, and had not occurred to me at all. My hope is that at some point someone ELSE, like the kids’ colleges, realized that this was something that needed to be done, and that Rob and William have already signed such forms. Looking at the HIPAA form, I vaguely remember them being given one like it (with some ceremony about it, like, “Now he’s 18 he gets his own HIPAA, Mom!”)—but I don’t FULLY remember if that happened (1) at the pediatrician (as opposed to at an eye appointment or something), and (2) if they filled out our names on it, and (3) if it happened for both Rob and William. So there’s my new/current fret.

WOW SCHOOL PLANNING IS A GIANT MESS RIGHT NOW! UNDERSTANDABLY!

Our school district recently released a 40+ page document about their plans for partial in-person schooling. They did a really good job, under the circumstances, and you can see a LOT of people did a LOT of work to come up with these plans; but it is clear to me, after reading the whole thing, that this can’t work. I could be wrong! Maybe it will work beautifully! But. The first part that made me yell out “What are we DOING???” was the part where it said that if a teacher becomes ill mid-day, they will open the door to the adjoining classroom, notify that classroom’s teacher that they are ill, ask that teacher to take care of both classrooms, and leave with all their possessions by the nearest exit. BY THE NEAREST EXIT. WITH ALL THEIR POSSESSIONS. AFTER JOINING THE AIR OF TWO CLASSROOMS. AND ASKING ANOTHER TEACHER TO TAKE CHARGE OF THE STUDENTS WHO HAVE BEEN SHARING AIR WITH THE TEACHER WHO IS NOW ILL.

(This is all assuming there is enough staff to even start the first day, let alone take over each other’s classrooms. The entire document is full of “*assuming adequate staff,” and that’s understandable, and I’m glad they seem to be aware that that could very well be a considerable issue. Already our district was very short of substitute teachers, and now they are even more short of substitute teachers and also short of bus drivers. It appears there are not many people who want poorly-paid part-time hours with no benefits and lots of people-exposure during a pandemic. And as we approach the scheduled start of school, I suspect more and more school employees will opt out. UNDERSTANDABLY.)

There is a LOT about how the school will be cleaning the living hell out of all surfaces, all day and all night, which I guess is supposed to be reassuring, but is less so with a virus believed to spread predominantly through shared air, and we are going to put the children and teachers in closed rooms with shared air, and they will have lunch in their classrooms and will have to take off their masks for that. TELL ME LESS ABOUT HOW YOU PLAN TO CLEAN THE SURFACES AND MORE ABOUT HOW YOU PLAN TO CLEAN THE AIR.

Then I got to the part where we learn that if someone in the school system is exposed to someone with a positive Covid-19 test, they and all their family members and “everyone they have close contact with” must leave the school system for 14 days, and/or until they’ve had a negative Covid-19 test. Well! So. Let’s say a teacher’s spouse has a positive Covid-19 test, so the teacher will be out for 14 days. Also the teacher’s two children will be out for 14 days. And then, what does “close contact” mean in an in-person school environment? The students in the teacher’s classroom? (That might NEED to happen, if there are no subs.) The students/teacher in the teacher’s children’s classrooms? The bus driver and other students on the teacher’s children’s bus? How many people are out for 14 days for each exposure?

The gist, which was in the 40s of pages when most people might have stopped reading, seems to be that one single positive Covid-19 test in the school system will likely mean closing down the entire school district. Maybe not! But probably. So what we are doing is spending a lot of time and effort to create a system that is expected to collapse, in order to make everyone feel that at least we tried.

Paul has been taking Fridays off of work, as he usually does in the summer in an attempt to spend down his vacation days. Usually this is really nice: it gives us a day each week for family activities or couple activities or dad-and-kids activities such as going to the movies, or going to a museum or attraction, or going to the pool, or going out for breakfast or lunch, or doing something we don’t want to do but need to do such as mattress shopping, or…well, you see the issue, now that there is a pandemic and we’re not doing any of these things. Now that it’s just “he’s at home all day,” and he’s ALWAYS at home all day, there is considerably less thrill to it. It means that I have more trouble getting my Friday stuff done, because he keeps being AROUND. Then, on Mondays, he’s been saying the three-day weekend makes it harder to get back into work. He came to talk to me THREE SEPARATE TIMES this morning before I’d even had BREAKFAST. GO TO WORK.

Without lingering on it, I want to say that I am now up 30 pounds from pre-pandemic times. This gives me important information, which is this: if I diet strictly at least 6 days a week, eating in what is a weird and challenging way (keto) but is the only diet that has been sustainable long-term for me, I can keep my weight SO LOW that my doctor says I would ONLY need to lose another 20 pounds to be in the “””healthy””” range on the chart. If I stop that strict and weird way of eating, and go back to eating a normal array of foods, the weight comes right back to me. It’s good to know. I had wondered.

The pandemic has made me focus more on making sure we’re getting exercise and good nutrition, despite all the restrictions on us right now: the kids used to get exercise walking to/from school and walking to meet friends, and I used to get exercise at my job, but now we have to do exercise on purpose. Which I’m finding harder to do, somehow, as the number on the scale goes up. Diet/thinness culture sets up such a false binary: either we are Thin, which is understood to mean we must be exercising and eating “healthy”; or else we are Fat, which is understood to mean that we don’t exercise and that we buy two super-sized value meals at the fast-food drive-through and eat them secretly before going home and making and eating dinner with the family, after which we eat a half-gallon of ice cream and an entire bag of chips.

It is hard to shake off the feeling that if we’re not going to get to be thin we might as well not do any of the exercising and nutrition we have been taught to associate with thinness—even though we know, we KNOW, it is OBSERVABLY TRUE, that there are ALSO a lot of dubious/unhealthy things that can lead to thinness (smoking, diet pills, eating disorders, exercise bulimia, eating insufficient calories, diseases and illnesses, fad diets that may or may not be good for us, foods that have been made low-calorie in non-healthy/non-nutritious ways); and that some people are thin without doing the strict exercise/food we associate with thinness; and that some fat people are doing the exercise/food we associate with thinness and are nevertheless fat, because that is the delightful variation of the human body; and that the things we have been taught to associate with thinness (exercise, good nutrition) are well worth doing for ourselves, unlinked to what our bodies look like.

WHY IS IT SO HARD TO GET THIS TO SINK IN? I feel like I have to fight it so persistently, the idea that if I’m going to be 30 pounds heavier I might as well not take a walk or do the strength-training video or whatever. As if THINNESS is the only possible reward for exercise and nutrition, rather than improved health and mood and physical ability—and it’s hard to do the work without the reward. THINNESS IS NOT THE REWARD.

I have not been getting books from the library during the pandemic, not because I think it isn’t safe (they have curbside pick-up, and I have insider knowledge about our library’s quarantine policies that makes me feel pretty comfortable; it doesn’t seem at this point as if books are a likely way for the virus to spread anyway; and also I could quarantine a bag of books at home for a few days if I wanted to be SURE-sure), but because I feel sheepish about it. It feels weird to say “I don’t feel safe working there right now, so I am on extended leave, and please cover my hours for me—and oh, while you’re there in an environment I don’t consider safe enough for ME, could you get me some books?” And anyway it would probably be fine but I just don’t want to.

All of this is to say I have finished my To Read pile, which I’d thought would never happen. And I have been re-reading a lot of the books I’d thought many times were worth owning because they would be SOOOOO nice to have in an apocalyptic situation where we couldn’t get library books. But also I want fresh books. And what I was wondering is if you’d like to help me make a list of Books To Consider Buying. Library books are so easy: they’re free! take them on a whim! if you don’t like them, you’re out NOTHING! just stop reading them and bring them back! Books Worth Buying is a totally different thing, and can include the issue of re-readability.

Are you already feeling a little nervous? I would be, if I were you. Telling someone you think they would be wise to pay $10-30 for a book is very different than suggesting they try it from the library. But don’t be nervous! For one thing, this is low-stakes. I can check reviews/descriptions first, and if I see “lyrical prose” or “Kate White had it all: a successful career as a magazine editor, a handsome and successful husband, a beautiful home in the suburbs, and two great children….UNTIL!!!,” I already know not to buy it. And if I do take a suggestion, and it’s not to my tastes, it was still fun to try, and I have lots of people to pass the book on to, and also I know how books are: just because someone else loves it doesn’t mean I will; just because I love it doesn’t mean someone else will.

But I will start by telling you some of the books I love, and I will come back and add more as I think of more, or as books mentioned in the comments section remind me of books I should have included. If you did NOT love these books, you will know that you and I don’t happen to be compatible in this area (though definitely compatible in MANY OTHER areas!), and probably I won’t like the books you like and vice versa AND THAT IS FINE! If I list SEVERAL OF YOUR FAVORITES, then maybe you will be bolstered to recommend MANY of your own favorites! Also: it is fine to ask questions, such as “Did you like such-and-such a book, do you like such-and-such an author, do you like this kind of book, do you like that kind of book?” Everyone has their own measures for making recommendations.

Fiction:

• almost anything by Maeve Binchy; there are a couple of her books that I didn’t like, but I own all the rest and I re-read them (all the recommendation lists suggest Rosamunde Pilcher for people who like Maeve Binchy, but I don’t know why; Rosamunde Pilcher books are fine, and I’ve read a few, but to me they’re not like Maeve Binchy)

• Elizabeth Strout: both Olive Kitteridge books, both Lucy Barton books, but not Amy & Isabelle (I don’t remember why; I just remember being disappointed by it)

• pretty much NOTHING that Oprah ever chose or ever would choose for her book club (SO BLEAK)

• in fact, nothing that makes a point of being unrelentingly bleak, nothing where the book’s “importance” comes from “shining a light on a terrible, terrible plight none of us can do anything about”

• and nothing where a major plot point is the abuse and/or traumatic death of an animal or child—unless somehow the author pulls it off, and there ARE books where that happens

• long ago I loved The Joy Luck Club and The Kitchen God’s Wife by Amy Tan; I don’t know if I still would, but those are good examples of books that SEEM like they’d be unrelentingly bleak, and yet the author pulls it off

• the Practical Magic books by Alice Hoffman (I’ve added Magic Lessons to my list)

• NO Jodi Picoult, never again, she has betrayed me too many times

• Good Omens, by Neil Gaiman. In general I like the whole Terry Pratchett, Douglas Adams kind of genre, except after awhile I get weary of it, and some of it is too much quirky/jokes and not enough plot. But overall I like it.

• Fredrik Backman: A Man Called Ove and Britt-Marie Was Here but NOT the Beartown books (I’m trying to remember why; I think I found them depressing and angering, and felt they lacked the human/character charm of the other books)

• Ann Patchett: The Dutch House, Bel Canto (but it BROKE me and I wouldn’t read it again right now even though I loved it), State of Wonder

• Elizabeth Berg: the early stuff (Talk Before Sleep, Open House, What We Keep, Joy School, The Pull of the Moon), but not the later stuff (The Handmaid and the Carpenter, The Day I Ate Whatever I Wanted, Dream When You’re Feeling Blue)

• SOME Anne Tyler (I have trouble remembering which titles go with which of her books, but I remember I liked A Patchwork Planet, and that there was one about a poorly-suited WWII couple that I found good but too depressing); I’ve added Redhead by the Side of the Road to my list

• despite flaws, I loved The Rook by Daniel O’Malley

• Nothing to See Here, by Kevin Wilson—a recent purchased-because-of-seeing-recommendations success

• nothing set in WWII, I just can’t, I have reached and then FAR EXCEEDED my capacity for books set in WWII, I read The Book Thief because I had to, and I was glad I did, but NO MORE, I BEG YOU, NO MORE WWII BOOKS, LET’S SET BOOKS IN LITERALLY ANY OTHER TIME PERIOD

• I generally like apocalyptic fiction (The Girl with All the Gifts, Station Eleven, The Stand, the Oryx and Crake trilogy, Girlfriend in a Coma), but perhaps not right this minute

• I enjoy a certain level of magic or time travel or whatever, but I like them pretty realistic/contemporary (like the Alice Hoffman Practical Magic books, or like Magic for Liars, or like The Rook or Nothing to See Here; I don’t usually like the kind where everyone has Futuristic Names and there are undefined made-up words you’re supposed to figure out from context (“hulaphone” or whatever)

• Some Stephen King in the past, but I may be done with it.

• I have liked a couple of Samantha Hunt books: The Invention of Everything Else and Mr. Splitfoot (I spent the whole book thinking she would HAVE to stick the landing—and she stuck the landing, and I started reading it again right away from the beginning as soon as I’d finished it)

• The Power, by Naomi Alderman, was the perfect book for 2016, but I don’t know if I want to feel that way right now

• Dept. of Speculation, by Jenny Offill

• Pride and Prejudice, Sense and Sensibility, Jane Eyre

• This is How You Die and Machine of Death

• Sarah Waters: Affinity YES, The Little Stranger NO (I don’t like “Who even knows what really happened?? Certainly not me, the omniscient author!” endings)

• I don’t like YA fiction. I know lots and lots of adults LOVE it, for MANY good reasons; I know YA fiction varies so much that it ought to be impossible to make a sweeping statement about not liking it; I have many times WISHED I liked YA fiction because those are the kinds of plots I want to read; I have many times TRIED a YA fiction book that was highly recommended and that many people mentioned they liked even though they don’t normally like YA fiction—and I never, never, never like it. It is similar with romance novels: I WANT to like them, I WANT to read about romance, I have tried MANY authors and MANY types of niche and mainstream romance novels, and I never, never, never like them. This is one of those areas where normally I would not volunteer that I don’t like YA/romance, because why volunteer that kind of information, especially when SO MANY PEOPLE already volunteer that exact information about those EXACT particular categories? Whose life is enriched by hearing someone else declare irrelevantly that they dislike something you love? But in this case it is relevant to the question I’m asking, and so I mention it, and I go into some detail so that you will know I am not being casually/scornfully dismissive on misguided/uninformed principle, and I hope it will not lead to the natural/understandable but nevertheless futile path of “Oh but have you tried…??”

Memoir/graphic:

• Suzanne Finnamore

• 80% of Augusten Burroughs and David Sedaris

• Roz Chast

• 80% of Lynda Barry

• Alison Bechdel

• NONE of the “I grew up in an APPALLING/SHOCKING/TRAUMATIC family situation, it was RELENTLESSLY GRIM!!” memoirs; no really, not even the one where the mom dies; no, not the one where their parents are manic and the kids were constantly in danger; no, I don’t want the one where they made sweet little pets of the city rats

• The Mental Load, by Emma (I have The Emotional Load on my list)

• Allie Brosh!! (I have Solutions and Other Problems on my list already, and have had it there for YEARS awaiting publication)

Update: Here’s the list that resulted from comments on this post: Books to Buy and/or Put on My Wish List

Elizabeth had her virtual scoliosis appointment this morning, and we were both very stiff and jumpy about it ahead of time (this was our first online medical appointment, and we didn’t know what to expect), and it went totally fine (though awkward) and was SO VERY MUCH BETTER than spending half the day driving to and from the big city and waiting in waiting rooms. And the doctor says she can stop wearing her brace! Which is very exciting! She is 15 years old, just under 5’9″ tall, and it is likely she is done growing. She is going to be shorter than ALL of her brothers (Rob is 6’1″, William is 6’4″, Edward is 6″ so far at 15 years old, and Henry is 5’7″ at only 13) (did you start reading this blog when I was pregnant with Henry, and now he is taller than you? isn’t everything so weird?), and she is already mad about it. She is slightly taller than me, at least. I will be shortest in my household, apparently, and at 5’8″ish I am not a short woman.

Her doctor, incidentally, is like a neverending stream of those cringy “When I was a doctor-in-training I said [this thing that sounded totally awkward but wasn’t at all what I meant, such as “Your breasts look beautiful”] and that’s when I learned to say [the highly preferable neutral thing, such as “Everything looks normal”].” Elizabeth and I agree he doesn’t give off actual creepy vibes, and he seems genuinely oblivious as he says things that make us wince. Today’s new hit was “Your curves look beautiful”—meaning that the two curves of her spine showed good improvement.

Our polydactyl cat is still not doing particularly well, even after two weeks (nearly halfway through a month-long prescription) of antibiotics. He is still barely eating or drinking; he is still bony and scrawny. I called the vet a week ago to ask about the subcutaneous fluids she mentioned, and she had me come in and they taught me how to do them. WARNING! The rest of this post will include some medical stuff involving needles and so forth. If you want to skip the rest of this post, this would be the moment. I will not write anything else in this post after the part about the cat’s medical treatments: you can just bail right now and you will miss nothing except feline medical stuff! Okay, I am going to proceed! I’m proceeding now with the descriptions! Last chance! Here we go!

Giving subcutaneous fluids involves making a “tent” of the cat’s stretchy skin in the shoulder area, and then putting a needle “into the tent,” and then the fluid goes from a bag down a tube and through the needle and under the skin, where it is gradually absorbed into the cat. I am so, so grateful that when the vet tech demonstrated the technique to me, she accidentally put the needle into the tent and then out through the side of the tent, so that the liquid just spilled out into his fur, because that showed me that even someone with MUCH more experience than me might do that; otherwise I might have given up by now, because I have made that same error repeatedly. Repeatedly. It makes me despair. I feel like I am NOT getting the hang of it, and there is no way to practice except by continuing to screw it up, and then working on learning how to fix it (theoretically you can just draw the needle back a bit, until it is no longer poking through the second layer of skin) (good for you, hanging in there like this, you are a real trouper).

I have watched YouTube videos and I understand the gist of what I am supposed to be doing; it’s just, now there’s nothing left except to practice, and it’s my poor cat who has to be practiced on. The videos and the vet tech and the vet all assured me that the cat doesn’t have many nerve endings in that area, and that’s why we do it there. And the vet and vet tech said the whole thing is trickier to manage correctly when the cat is dehydrated to begin with (the skin is tougher and the tent is less roomy). And he is very good and doesn’t show signs of pain, or of wanting to escape. More like depression, resignation, despair. The poor thing. It’s not enough to be sick, he also has to have incompetent medical care. Well. At least I feel as if I am gaining another life skill. Small comfort for the cat, I guess. “Wow, so happy for your journey or whatever.” Says the cat.