Kids will remember this, but don’t make it normal for them

Balancing Act

None of this is normal, and you don’t have to pretend it is.

Even if you’re a parent. Even if an expert told you it’s important to maintain routines during this time of uncertainty, and another expert told you children need structure, and five of the six parenting Facebook groups you joined in the last two weeks have shared the same vaguely scold-y sample schedule with ageappropriate chores and reasonable screen time limits.

If those things work for you and your family, by all means. Do the things that feel true and right for your people right now. You know best.

But maybe you feel overwhelmed, at times, by dread for what lies ahead and grief for what’s already been lost and sadness for all the ways lives have been upended and rage that doctors and nurses are having to ration their personal protective equipment. And maybe summoning the will to adhere to some semblance of a typical weekday routine makes you want to weep from physical and emotional exhaustion. I think you should go ahead and weep.

Weep, my friends. Even if you’re a parent. Even if your kids see you weeping.

None of this is normal, and you don’t have to pretend it is.

Our kids will remember the time they lived through a global pandemic. Not infants. It will be on us to narrate this time back to them, and I hope we make room in our narration to tell about the beautiful souls who are feeding their neighbors and serving their communities and joining together in song. (I’m making sure my kids, 10 and 14, hear as many of those stories as possible right now.)

But kids old enough to be creating tangible memories, beyond the kind of memories that live in our senses, will view this as a pivotal, formative, unforgettable time in their lives.

It’s OK if it feels like nothing they’ve ever been through.

It’s OK if we let them in on the truth, which is that life sometimes takes really, really unexpected turns. Something you could never have conjured in your wildest imagination suddenly becomes your new reality. Something you worried during your quietest, most vulnerable moments might happen — but spent most of your other moments deciding was crazy — suddenly happens.

Someone got very sick. A relationship ended. A job went poof. A child didn’t come home. Planes flew into buildings.

And then everything paused. As it should have. And nothing felt normal for a while. And when it started to feel normal again, it was a new normal. The old normal was never coming back.

We’re in the middle of that. Or not. Maybe we’re at the beginning of it. We don’t even know yet.

We know half a million people around the world are infected with COVID-19 and more than 24,000 people have died from it, including about 1,300 people in the United States. We know that in Illinois, one family lost two sisters within 10 days: Wanda Bailey, 63, and Patricia Frieson, 61.

We know 3.3 million of our fellow Americans applied for unemployment benefits in a single week. We know some of our favorite places, run by some of our favorite people, will never open again. We know there are no games or concerts or movies or worship services or school days to attend. We know we’re not supposed to see grandparents. We know the things we’ve been looking forward to — graduation ceremonies, proms, camps, summer vacations — may be no-go’s.

It’s impossible, for a lot of us, to know all of that and to carry on as though this pandemic is a blip. An inconvenience to be worked around. An obstacle to be overcome on our daily march toward efficiency and enrichment.

I’ve decided what I want my kids to remember about this time is that we did our best. We’re following the stay-at-home order. We’re staying informed. We’re checking on our vulnerable friends and helping how we can. We’re thanking essential workers with gift cards.

We’re singing a lot of Bon Jovi. We’re watching a lot of movies. We’re playing a lot of cards. We’re baking so much bread. We’re not doing that much e-learning. We’re not sticking to anything resembling a schedule.

I want them to remember that people looked out for us too. My mom sent us a package of card games the other day with a note tucked inside. She signed it, “Big social distancing hugs to you.” That note will always, always, always sit tucked inside the Five Crowns game.

I don’t talk them out of what they’re feeling, which ranges on any given day from bored to terrified to slap-happy to angry to sad and back to bored again. They see me feel all those things too. (Except bored. No time.) I don’t say, “We could have it a lot worse.” I say, “I know. This is really hard. It’s not forever.”

I don’t need them to tune out the world around them and proceed apace. I don’t need them to see me do that either. I don’t think that’s what it means to cope.

I think we cope by being extra gentle with ourselves and with one another. I think that’s more important than structure and routine. I think we have permission to make up these days as we go, with kindness and safety as our guiding lights.

I think most other things can wait.

None of this is normal, and you don’t have to pretend it is.

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