I find my emotions are all over the place. I assume that’s the new normal. I woke up this morning feeling okay…yesterday I woke up really stressed and cranky, but I was nervous about going to the grocery store.

Simple things have changed, haven’t they? One day we will look back and wonder how we made it through. I wanted/needed (it wasn’t a need in that we were literally out of food, but there were a lot of specific things we hoped to get ) to go to the grocery store, so I planned to go around 9 am on Monday hoping it wouldn’t be too busy. I was correct, and the store was even well stocked! The last time I went to the store two weeks earlier I had been taken aback by wide expanses of empty product sections, empty pasta aisles, empty toilet paper aisles, etc. This time there were empty shelves here and there still, but mostly they had everything one might need. They even had some toilet paper at the time, which made me feel more positive.

I bought hopefully enough to avoid the store for another two weeks—we’ve been getting stuff delivered as well from Imperfect Foods, and we did Blue Apron last week, so we have no shortage of anything. I’ve been doing a small amount of what some might call hoarding but others would call preparing for the worst as well, and hopefully we come out the end of this ready to go on a week long camping trip somewhere.

I spent the rest of the day teaching, doing a few videos for my students and one to share with the world, and trying to relax.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qKtbjR4kJF0

There are a lot of unknowns right now, and it’s very hard to deal with. They say one should just focus on the day ahead, but if that’s the case, each day is just the same and drags on, and I guess that’s really the challenge. There’s nothing necessarily to look forward to: no vacations, no trips, no concerts…I guess I can look forward to the weekend for once, but to do what? They are even talking of closing State Parks since some were too crowded over the weekend, and then what?

As I was writing this, one of my twitter followers did something that has made my day happier. She left a tip in my paypal tip jar, and tweeted one of my videos—the one above, and now I am all warm and fuzzy and feel really grateful. I’m thinking of doing a longer “concert” perhaps streaming somehow. My brother-in-law has done a few cello live performances on facebook and I admire his nerve and the one I saw was quite entertaining, so maybe I can do something like that. I’d love to monetize it a bit, at least with donations requested (seriously, we may not have concerts again this year, who knows?) but I also just want to bring music to people.

In any case, I’d better get on with my day. Time to workout, teach, and practice a bit too. Today will be an okay day.

I can do this. Things are okay. I have a fridge full of fresh fruits and veggies—I have gotten two shipments from a company called Imperfect Foods, and we got a Blue Apron package this week. We keep eating meals full of vegetables under the idea that “down the road” we might not be able to, and honestly, it’s fantastic. We haven’t eaten so well in years, probably, because neither of us has had enough time to cook so much, and suddenly my weekends are just…free.

I’ve often joked that I’d make more money only teaching than playing other gigs. While it’s not true, especially in regards to shows at the Fox Theatre and such, it certainly makes me more relaxed when I’m only teaching and not worried about running off here and there. I’m hoping that Congress passes a stimulus bill that helps people out because then I will be less worried about my students dropping out due to being unable to pay. If people keep getting paid, they’ll keep taking lessons, and things will be okay, even if I’m just sitting all by myself in the room talking to a computer. Not to mention that will help everybody!

If not, I worry that over the next month or two students will start to leave lessons. It’s a hard enough time already without all of us worrying to death about money and health care.

But today I shall stay positive. It’s Wednesdays and things are going to be okay.

We added a new basket to the cat tree. It is popular.

Oh, and I made this video the other day. Enjoy!

How much difference a week or two makes. Two weeks ago (or more) I was commenting on people’s facebook pages that they weren’t thinking realistically that the virus wasn’t going to come here. And here we are, today, with a  shelter in place order going into effect on Monday.

I slept in this morning, then did a long video workout. I made potatoes and eggs for lunch, and the potatoes took much longer than anticipated, so we ate lunch late while chatting on facetime with my sister Leslie and her family. Then we went out for a walk in the neighborhood (social distancing of course, which meant that people were crossing the street to avoid one another) and then I had to record a video for my band: we were planning to meet this weekend to record a video for the Tiny Desk Concert, but instead are doing it piecemeal. Maybe it’ll work, maybe it won’t. It took awhile to figure out set up and then another while to get a take I was reasonably happy with. Music making is difficult in these times.

I feel like since I never leave the house to work, I’m constantly both at work and not at work. I told my students they can send me videos of practice for feedback and some have taken that to heart! I realize I’m lucky that I can continue to work from home and that so far my students seem to be happy to make the switch to online lessons.

I can’t believe it’s already past 6 pm and it’s time to think about dinner. We did get curbside takeout somewhere last night, and so probably I should cook tonight to save money. Then again, we want to support our favorite restaurants that are doing takeout/curbside service. Then again, does that actually spread the disease more? We get conflicting information from different sources…I guess nobody knows for sure? I wish we had some smart people in charge instead of what we have.

But these guys. They are really starting to be besties again. At least there’s that.

Some people are doing a good job keeping up on all the changes from day to day. I’m just struggling to get by—making the transition to online teaching, reading and responding to dozens upon dozens of emails about online teaching, about dealing with the restrictions the virus has thrown upon us…spending too much time reading the news and scrolling (this I need to cut down on)…it’s been a tough time!

I’ve made a document of all the gigs and concerts that I’ve lost so far. It’s been a lot, but I can power through. I’m missing playing though, and I’m debating whether doing a live stream “concert” would be something worth doing?

I’m lucky in that so far all of my private students are agreeing to move online, but the longer this goes on…how many of them will have to cut back on violin lessons as an unnecessary expense? Hopefully few and I can keep my hope up! I’m also teaching most of my college students in a similar way and honestly, it is almost as good as an in person lesson. You don’t need a lot of fancy technology, unless you don’t have a computer or a smart phone. People online will make you think you need a $400 microphone and expensive headset to make it work, but so far the biggest difference I’ve seen in my lessons seems to be the internet connection. I joined a few facebook groups for online teaching ideas, and one of the posts yesterday seemed to imply that you should make sure no one else was using the internet for streaming as it would slow down your connection. I thought that was hilarious because at my house I’m using video chat and Louie is streaming video and using video chat for his job as well and we just have to deal.

I sometimes think maybe my students are just different than others…other teachers say, make them use zoom. I feel like if I tell mine to do something specific that will just make everyone give up. I asked mine to do what was easiest for them, and truly, everybody has different technology comfort levels. For instance, I was attempting to use bluetooth headphones yesterday and I couldn’t get them to work and so ended up hanging up on a student. Another student couldn’t get the video on skype to work and ended up having to use a different device. Some tell me they’ve never used video chat before and don’t understand it at all…I think the name of the game right now is making people feel as comfortable as possible so I’m teaching using a variety of platforms, and it seems to be working well enough. I won’t insist that their parents stop working remotely during the lesson even if it slows down the internet because that is (dare I say it) more important than the lesson. Music is important to life, but let’s not overstate the importance of a music lesson. I think it’s important for kids to keep things as normal as possible, and that it’s important to learn music, and if we are going to be stuck inside for awhile, we might as well keep going, plus it’s something to keep occupied with and take your mind off other difficulties. But I don’t care if the sound quality is a bit sketchy and if the student isn’t standing exactly in the right place. Maybe I need to step away from the facebook groups!

So how are we doing? Stressed and anxious…but doing okay. I’ve been eating well (we’ve been cooking up tons of vegetables) and exercising daily since getting back from Atlanta. I miss going out and seeing people—I never even thought of myself as that social but there’s something about feeling like you can’t do something that makes you especially miss it. I suppose our favorite activity to do was to go out to eat, to let someone else serve up the food, and we would eat it surrounded by other people chatting and hanging out. Who knows when we will get to do that again?

I am still holding out a twinge of hope that summer is better but I also know this could go on for a year or more, at least in some form. I have plenty of toilet paper because I stocked up before we went to Atlanta. Louie can do his job remotely, even if he also misses going to work and seeing colleagues and being around people (it’s the being around people, just generally, that really bugs me). I am lucky to have him, and I feel empathy for those that live alone and might feel especially lonely. I worry about the long reaching effects of social distancing. I worry about job losses, especially for the self-employed, and also for those with employers. In my field, most people have lost their work, so many if not most of my friends are affected. I have friends who are already on furlough from their jobs as well. We may not get to go to France, but it’ll be okay: we will go another time. Or we will still go…part of me still has hope that the scientists and doctors will figure this out really quickly!

I call this Day 5 because we drove back from visiting friends in Atlanta last Sunday, so this is Day 5 of teaching from home. The weird thing is that I actually have a weekend in front of me: with proper time off and everything, even though I didn’t ask for it and didn’t want it. We’ve decided to start a garden since I have the time, and bought things we needed earlier in the week. It’s been quite rainy this week but hopefully tomorrow we can at least start the weeding and redo the borders on the garden beds in the backyard (they used to have bricks lining them, but with the plumbing issue last year the backhoe ruined a lot of them).

It’s too bad we don’t have any leadership from the state or federal level in this crisis, but our city leaders have been doing well. We need more testing and we need help for people—I am a firm believer in straight up cash to help out, because what else will really do it? But our federal elected officials are more concerned with making profits and hiding the truth than actually helping people or avoiding a pandemic (horrible conspiracy theories involving the president either causing the pandemic for profit or, at a minimum, allowing it to grow for profit, start to feel more real when you read about senators having intelligence briefings, then selling stock and buying stock in companies that help you telecommute, and then telling the american people that the virus is under control or not an issue at all…it starts to make you think anything is possible with these horrible people in charge, who care only about their own personal profits).

I know I’m ranting, but this is my page to do so . And things are rough right now, for everybody. Don’t you wish we had a president you could trust was doing her (or his, I suppose) best for the nation, for everybody in it?

Anyway, what are your weekend plans? Are you going to work on your yard, if you have one? Binge watch TV? Rearrange your furniture? Watch live-stream concerts?