It doesn’t feel like a holiday, and that’s okay. There isn’t a barbecue or cookout to attend. There isn’t an official fireworks show. There isn’t a functioning federal government with an appropriate response to the pandemic we are living in. Yet, life goes on.

I’m playing a short concert with my friend Michael and our band this afternoon. It’ll be hot and I’m sort of regretting it, but I agreed because it’s good to get out of the house. It’ll be livestreamed at 3 pm CDT.

It’s been over a week of cooking at home. This isn’t so bad: I’ve gotten much better at cooking and improvising pretty decent meals. Last night we made pasta with mushrooms and kale from the CSA, a teeny amount of chard from the garden, and preserved lemons I’d made a few months ago. I’ve made a few jars of fridge pickles lately with some things from the CSA too: dilly green beans and dill pickles. Those will be ready to eat when we get back from our trip to Chautauqua. If we can take it…so far Missouri isn’t on the quarantine list for NY.

It’s hard to know what to do: we’ve been pretty cautious, and we think this is an okay risk to take. We also still want to do our camping trip later in the month. Camping isn’t a hugely risky thing, we’ll stay apart from people as much as we can while hiking, cook or pack our own meals, wear masks, I have loads of wipes and such…the other option is just sit at home and wait, and part of me says, if Louie is supposed to be back in the classroom in September we might as well take these risks now because that is certainly risky…not that that’s a good way to look at things, but as I’ve said before, I start to feel like a crazy person trying to avoid this virus that so many have just given up on.

(And then I remember that I am teaching online from home and haven’t played a real concert or a show since March and it is unlikely that will happen again in the next 6 months, because without a strong federal response to this pandemic, we are on our own and thousands and thousands will suffer and die, needlessly, as other countries have shown us.)

I started blogging feeling pretty good so I’ll try to return there. Are you doing anything fun for the holiday? I asked one student that earlier this week and she said “setting off fireworks in our backyard!”