Take A Breath

My son is back at college…he’s finally back with his friends and he’s happy. He’s wearing his mask, because they don’t want school to shut back down again.

I feel that right now everyone is holding their breath…kind of like they did when they allowed small businesses to open back up.

Many think that we will go back for two weeks and all the elementary schools will shut back down….and then all the colleges will go back to online until next semester….and that’s possible…but worrying about it won’t change a thing.

Many think going back to school is killing our children…many are scared and worried…and the schools have a really hard job of trying to figure out what is the best thing.

I have a child that is homeschooled , but she will go to her music teacher, go on field trips and go to some classes with her homeschool group. I also have one in college…and no, I’m not aware of homeschool college.

This past weekend I clowned at an event for our store…because we felt that people needed to smile and laugh…and I think people needed it….but it was the absolute hardest time I’ve ever had clowning….

I could not interact with the kids…I had to keep my distance. I wore a mask, and I just felt so very unable to communicate verbally or with my expressions. I never realized how much we use our lips and our expressions to communicate. How much we read lips to understand what people are saying. I felt so very useless…and that I did a poor job as a clown.

But I was dealing with an impossible situation…as many of us are…we are dealing with an impossible situation.

The truth is that our children aren’t safe. They aren’t safe when they are at school, when they are at home…when they are anywhere. Tragedy can happen no matter how much we try to protect them.

I am not here to judge anyone on sending your kid, or not sending your kid. I think there are amazing arguments on both sides.

I’m not a doctor, so I will not debate all of the data and what will happen…I will say in the course of this pandemic over the last six months we have had ….

I would say that those are some pretty good odds ….and I pray that they remain that way as the kids head back to school.

When my kids learned to drive….I would lay awake until they got home. When I would hear a siren, I would call my son. I made him text me when he got to work or school. I became obsessed with his safety. I was terrified that he would die. I was convinced that I would lose him how I lost his biological father, in a car accident. I became overwhelmed with anxiety…to the point I was almost sick until he would text me. That was NOT living.

We cannot become so overwhelmed with fear that we quit living. We cannot fear the unknown. We cannot live in our houses for a year…we have to at some point, start living again.

I’m not saying, take a cruise, or lick all the door handles when you go to the store. I’m saying be cautious…but live. In the living, laugh…and in the laughing…begin to love life again. There’s more life to live…go live it!