I Don't Know What the Next Steps Are. Do You?
Beatrix is in bed. We're on the 3rd floor working. We occasionally stream music that one or the other of us runs into in this weird time of online creation (right now it's Billy Bragg, "Waiting for the Great Leap Forward"). I'm drinking a rhubarbarita made with the last of the rhubarb I got from my friend Jenn, and working on PPP loan forgiveness calculations for clients.
Tonight was the SPA Showcase online — the final one of the year because school ends next week. Beatrix performed a video of "Part of that World" in it, and her choir did an amazing job of performing pieces together via individual google hangout boxes. If the current guidelines hold and she can't do choir next year I don't want to even think about it.
There was a similar consolidated dance number at the end and B contributed some circus tricks. The art and performances were beautiful and got me very teary. It's struck me all year how strongly SPA has managed to integrate the arts into school life, in a way that is very similar and yet extremely different from when I was there. The whole school-year-end thing, and especially in this way, has me extremely verklempt.
I struggle with feeling that the governor is both opening up things way too fast, and that at the same time the closures will put the places I care most about out of business. The "coach" metaphor is not lost on me.
Cases in Minnesota have spiked. Nurses I know report that it's a nightmare in the hospitals already. According to them (and I have no reason to believe otherwise than the first hand stories), ICU beds are at 95% capacity, and the only reason they have any room is that the hospitals are already making the choice to leave those who will likely die, or who have DNRs, or other conditions, in the regular wards so that they can keep the ICUs for those that *might* make it. And many of those don't.
Meanwhile, stores have opened — a little, but it's quiet, tentative, unsustainable. I have not been shopping. Everyone feels like they are holding their breath.
The governor said yesterday that restaurants can open on June 1 — but only for outside dining, with distancing, and other regulations. This blindsided the industry, who had been preparing for re-opening on that day with occupancy and other restrictions, but the outside part had not previously even been hinted at. Most small restaurants don't have more than a table or 2 of outside seating, and that area is cheek-by-jowl against where the line for takeout is. Municipalities are not even able to take outdoor seating permit requests right now. For a lot of small places, it's a death knell after a long 8 weeks.
And some of the largest churches in the state have announced they'll be holding services.
I don't know what the answer is. I'm grateful I'm not on the governor's policy team. I'm not someone posturing that I know more than the CDC does about the virus simply because I was on honors chem in high school. But how this is being handled at the state level seems ... problematic ... at best, I'm not very happy with city leadership on it, and the federal response is simply nonexistent.
I'm in tears for a lot of reasons tonight, and they don't all have to to with tequila, nostalgia, school year-end, or the frustration of the PPP program.
And I'm just hoping my family is resilient. (photo credit: Scott Streble)
Tonight was the SPA Showcase online — the final one of the year because school ends next week. Beatrix performed a video of "Part of that World" in it, and her choir did an amazing job of performing pieces together via individual google hangout boxes. If the current guidelines hold and she can't do choir next year I don't want to even think about it.
There was a similar consolidated dance number at the end and B contributed some circus tricks. The art and performances were beautiful and got me very teary. It's struck me all year how strongly SPA has managed to integrate the arts into school life, in a way that is very similar and yet extremely different from when I was there. The whole school-year-end thing, and especially in this way, has me extremely verklempt.
I struggle with feeling that the governor is both opening up things way too fast, and that at the same time the closures will put the places I care most about out of business. The "coach" metaphor is not lost on me.
Cases in Minnesota have spiked. Nurses I know report that it's a nightmare in the hospitals already. According to them (and I have no reason to believe otherwise than the first hand stories), ICU beds are at 95% capacity, and the only reason they have any room is that the hospitals are already making the choice to leave those who will likely die, or who have DNRs, or other conditions, in the regular wards so that they can keep the ICUs for those that *might* make it. And many of those don't.
Meanwhile, stores have opened — a little, but it's quiet, tentative, unsustainable. I have not been shopping. Everyone feels like they are holding their breath.
The governor said yesterday that restaurants can open on June 1 — but only for outside dining, with distancing, and other regulations. This blindsided the industry, who had been preparing for re-opening on that day with occupancy and other restrictions, but the outside part had not previously even been hinted at. Most small restaurants don't have more than a table or 2 of outside seating, and that area is cheek-by-jowl against where the line for takeout is. Municipalities are not even able to take outdoor seating permit requests right now. For a lot of small places, it's a death knell after a long 8 weeks.
And some of the largest churches in the state have announced they'll be holding services.
I don't know what the answer is. I'm grateful I'm not on the governor's policy team. I'm not someone posturing that I know more than the CDC does about the virus simply because I was on honors chem in high school. But how this is being handled at the state level seems ... problematic ... at best, I'm not very happy with city leadership on it, and the federal response is simply nonexistent.
I'm in tears for a lot of reasons tonight, and they don't all have to to with tequila, nostalgia, school year-end, or the frustration of the PPP program.
And I'm just hoping my family is resilient. (photo credit: Scott Streble)
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