When this all began, what seems like a legitimate lifetime ago, I wrote a post that included a list of ways to possibly utilize this sudden free time. So many of us wrote lists like this! We were more innocent just a few weeks back.

Since then I’ve heard a lot of talk about the “phases” of this pandemic and all the changes we are living through. I’ve had a lot of good conversations about that idea, read some insightful pieces and listed to helpful podcasts. The idea that we are all grieving a lost way of life and going through some of the traditional phases of grief, even - like denial and anger.

My first phase, obviously, was enthusiastic list-making. A more recent phase - one that played out a couple days ago - was total annoyance that I couldn’t figure out how I was going to get butter and a few other basics without making another run to the store/I DON’T WANT TO DO THIS ANYMORE.

It was one of several (hundred) annoyances that plagued me at the outset of this week. Annoyances that are - it must be noted - minor, and evidence of our family’s incredible luck and privilege under the best of circumstances, and certainly now.

I was annoyed that the sudden onset of online school for the foreseeable future meant that our children each needed a way to complete their work and communicate with their teacher, and that meant that Nora had been given my laptop. I was annoyed at this while firmly recognizing how fortunate she is to have something to complete her work on at all.

I initially figured this would be fine - great even - because I would be so creatively driven that I’d complete any writing projects in the 15-minute breaks she takes occasionally from her assignments. That during those 15-minute breaks I would be poised and motivated. I would find a quiet spot in the house where I could write without distraction, effortlessly complete a section of whatever story I was working on and then hand the computer back to Nora and get back to meal-planning or contentedly folding laundry.

That is the foolishness I envisioned. That, instead of the reality: grabbing the computer, sitting on the nearest uncluttered surface and trying to place a grocery order. And should I go to the store to pick it up or have it delivered, and what if the next delivery window isn’t until two weeks from now? What is the right way to be responsible? And how is any of this fair for people out there working, making this possible for us? It is not fair.

Quiet time to write is what I envisioned, instead of being visited repeatedly during my 15 minutes of computer time by Aidy, who is twirling some kind of wand made out of a stick and aluminum foil and wants to tell me about her “powers,” and do I want “my wish granted,” and the thing is I do want my wish granted and that wish includes spending an hour alone, one solid, golden hour away from my family.

But I decide not to tell her that, and so she keeps talking, asking if maybe my wish is “to have all the love in the world?” at which point I have to relent: yes I would like that wish. I try to go back to the task at hand, but I can’t, because she is now granting my wish and it turns out there is a lot more to say about it. A lot, you guys. And I know what you’re thinking…just smile and ignore her. But Aidy isn’t ignore-able, and furthermore, she is vindictive, both in subtle and aggressive ways. Try to steal a glance at the computer screen when she is granting me “all the love in the world?” She’ll announce that what she would like is to have “a mommy who cared,” about her. Or, in a rage, she’ll dump a basket of toys on my feet - hard toys that hurt - and, before I can admonish her, explain that she “had to do it.”

That’s what I envisioned. Mini-work sessions of admirable efficiency, or perhaps summoning productivity late at night when the children have retreated to their rooms to read and draw and sleep (instead of what I am doing, watching hours of “Homeland” with J, all snuggled in our bed, gratefully trading the troubles of our current world for the troubles of that fictionalized one).

That, instead of the reality, which is that when Nora - Nora, who has so gracefully navigated this period, doing her online school work without complaint, drawing pictures for her little sister that she slips under her door late at night, happily hitting a ball with her tennis racket against the low stone wall of our patio when she’s bored - asks me politely for my computer back, I clutch it desperately (my lifeline to the previous world where I could do my work whenever I wanted and the tool I currently need for procuring now mystical goods like flour) and utter an anxious, “Just a second.”

These complaints are so silly when I take the time to acknowledge them. They seem complicated to me when I’m immersed in the day, but the problems are so obvious. I can’t get a lot done in 15-minute bursts because sometimes it takes me 15 minutes to decide how I want one sentence to sound. I don’t want to work late at night because that’s when J and I get to hang out, and “Homeland” - have you seen it?! - we can’t stop. That it’s hard to get much done at all, ever, because me and the kids are home together, all the time, and they have a lot of crucial things to tell me every five minutes (literally none of the things are crucial).

I mean maybe if I were a stronger person, able to truly remove myself from the chaos of my now crowded home, I would be able to do those things, but I’m definitely not that person.

Also, quick reminder: taking care of children, or other loved ones, is so incredibly tiring all on its own. Honestly, just contemplating all this - all the astounding and sad and unthinkable moments - is tiring on its own.

I think on a deeper note, the annoyance I was feeling earlier this week was that during the list-making phase I feel very purposeful, and recently I’ve been feeling the opposite.

I was talking with a friend yesterday who said that with this virus and the associated stay-at-home orders, he suddenly realized he was “completely non-essential” and I laughed and said, “me too!” Not needed on the front lines. No skills that are helpful in the slightest at this time.

There are so many heroes out there getting us through, and the rest of us - at least most of us - are just trying not to mess up these new societal rules so we don’t make it harder on those guys and everyone else.

The other night our dog, Maisie, discovered a weak spot in our fence and sprinted into our next-door neighbor’s yard to greet them, tail wagging furiously, jumping up to lick their faces, clearly in search of some attention beyond the confines of our home. She then darted across the street to where a couple was walking a dog, who she tried to engage in some very enthusiastic-borderline-manic play before galloping across the lawn of the pool club, finding a stray tennis ball, picking it up and hurdling back towards the other dog for round two.

I ran out to get her, but Maisie is one of those dogs who, when you try to get her to calm down and stay in one place, thinks it is exceptionally fun to freeze - a mischievous look in her eyes - run in the opposite direction, come back towards you like, “Ok, ok you got me,” then freeze and repeat the same behavior. A wonderful, terrible game!

I was wearing my pink Crocs, which have been a great comfort to me lately but are not ideal for chasing a Border Collie mix who - like the rest of us - just wanted a few moments of freedom.

She circled and doubled back and raced in a zigzag while I shouted “Maisie, COME,” a command we very clearly need to work on as she did anything but. She finally stopped when the very kind couple with the dog stood still, offering themselves up as bait, to try and help me out. But I had to go right up to them to grab her before she took off again. Right up, way closer than 6-feet-away.

I felt awful. I know that in the grand scheme of things this was no big deal. My family has been doing a good job at following the guidelines without making ourselves crazy. We’re not worrying needlessly about getting this virus, while we also know we certainly could. We are doing everything we can with the information we’ve got.

But, I mean, I had one job. I both thanked and apologized profusely to the couple before dragging Maisie through our front door. I started to deliver an impassioned tirade as she sank to the floor, barely looking at me through half-closed, sorrowful eyes, before the kids stopped me, protesting me that she didn’t mean anything bad by it. She just wanted to go see everybody.

She just wanted to go see everybody, and I can’t blame her because I want that too. I want it too!

Furthermore, while everybody being in the house together is yielding many beautiful moments, it also means it might take hours to complete a task that normally takes a fraction as long because everybody is interrupting me constantly, oh my god. When you need groceries you need groceries and there’s no ideal plan anymore. And I don’t have an essential job right now, it’s fine. Settle down.

For me, stating these truths helps diffuse the stress; helps me change my wistful, tangled meanderings into something more straightforward, more easygoing, even in this decidedly non-easygoing environment. Because there is purpose in making even the littlest choices. In moving forward, even if we’re stumbling.

Even if we’re stumbling for real because Crocs aren’t good running shoes, there is purpose in getting the dog back. In saying we’re sorry. In making a plan to fix the fence, so that we can keep even the wildest ones safe at home the best we can.