Those of you who do not know me well, let me begin by stating the one thing that has gone unchallenged in my life, from childhood, is my strong passion for equality, empowerment. I may be biased but I was born into a society that supports the need for unfaltering strong female voices and I am one of those.
I have found myself in a strange place during this pandemic. I do not appreciate that women seem to be disproportionately affected by Covid in all aspects of their lives, but it that not something we are already familiar with? Personally, I feel well connected to my desire to nurture, protect and guide people during all moments, especially that of crisis or great stress. To stand up during Covid and help to make others comfortable and realize their own strength is something I volunteer for and I own that. I do not necessarily believe that these feelings or experience are gender biased. I believe they are personally chosen and driven from a deeper place. I do believe that in our social culture and economy women have been labelled as this role and the collective pressure is real and felt inside all people. That is a civilized lifetime of behavior to overcome. I have faith we will. The pandemic has been a time of learning and I have faith we will come out in a new normal. We are only at the very beginning of this long journey.
Today I am thinking a lot about school, opening schools and prioritising our children and careers. This is something I am still struggling with trying to get through this pandemic. I have not been able to quite hash this out. I cannot lie my son has had too much screen time. I have been balancing my hours between all of the commitments I have for my career and trying to spend as much time as possible educating and playing with my son. I envy the families with multiple children at this time, but we are doing our best to get through. Oh yeah and somewhere in there I have to take care of myself and have time to spend with my husband. I have never been more thankful for all of the childcare I once had, including school. My son is still in early childhood education, this will be his last year before he starts his journey into the grades. All of that being said, I am still struggling with the decision on schools come September.
Living in the Northeast we have been blessed to be taking the pandemic very seriously and I am very proud of our Northeastern ways. I am still nervous about taking my child out of the protective bubble he has been living in since March. I am not so nervous about taking him out into public from time to time or being in small gatherings for short intervals but I am very nervous about putting him into a constant setting of potential exposure. Since March we have had no colds, no coughs, no fevers, no nothing and now we are considering jumping back into that risk pool.
We all know that schools are amazing for socialization, education and spreading germs. Masks or no masks. What I am worried about is that if we are compromising the immune systems of our children to other illnesses what happens when Covid is added to that mix. That being said, I understand the urgency for figuring something out. What I do not appreciate is how I have seen in the headlines that women are being pointed out as the ones who have to choose, job or children. No no no no no no no, not ok. No matter what the decision should be collective, parents are not having to choose, but having to balance. To the single parents, who have no support, I bow down to you. I believe you are the parents who should be first in line for childcare. I may be way out of line, but the rest of us I believe can figure this all out. The future needs to be different. Maybe school days are not traditional works days, maybe we should not be rushing back to get to what once was. Why can’t we continue to figure out something different. One parent works mornings, one afternoons and share nightly responsibilities finding time for more work if needed. Honestly with that type of focus we can be extremely productive and attentive. Why rush to get families back into a place of unsustainable work and life schedules. I would love to see proposals for a new type of schooling all together. I think children are much more capable than we have been giving them credit for and we need to see that. Let us figure out together what the best plan of action to keep our children safe, keep our families prioritized and have healthy fruitful work careers.
I will refrain from jumping into the disgust I hold for the American entitlement we are all experiencing. Clubs and bars holding priority over schools…. Seriously people. Can we learn to be single and not be drunk. I wish I had found Yoga much earlier in my life and I hope many more will.
I would love to hear thoughts, even if you just think I’m on a crazy rant 🙂Â
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