Oh, so first of all I want to make clear that I don’t blame teachers in any way for the workload they’re assigning or the jobs they’re doing. I totally heart teachers. Also I wonder if Poppy’s principal is reading my blog because last night several hours after posting my rant about home education, we got a recorded phone call telling us that we can just relax and do what we can and the most important thing was to play and be safe. So I appreciate that. Is Poppy’s principal really reading this, or is this pure vanity? Just in case, Holla Mrs. P.!!

I’m a social person. I also need a lot of validation from my friends because my brain tends to go off on weird unhealthy directions and my friends ground me. So not being able to hang out with my friends has been a really hard thing.

It’s funny the way that the little things are the ones that break us. Somehow I’m coping with the idea that we’re going to be inside for a long while. Our Family Fun Time is quickly becoming Family Unfun Time. I’m failing at homeschooling, and I will probably know someone who dies from this, but the thing that gets me?

Thaddeus and Poppy’s inability to have a playdate with Pearl and Hendrix.

These 4 kids are closer than close. I met their mom Scrubs (she’s a healthcare worker y’all) when Thaddeus and Pearl were just over a year old and we’ve been besties ever since. It was so convenient when Hendrix and Poppy came along and were the same age too. These kids are more than friends–they’re family. They love each other, they play together, they fight with each other, they camp out at each other’s houses, they hit each other (well, we’ve mostly grown out of that now) and woe upon the person who dares mess with one of the four because the other three are coming and it’s not going to be pretty.

My kids keep asking when their next playdate is. Can we move Pearl and Hendrix up to the cabin with us? When can we have a sleepover? When will we see them? And there’s really no answer. That’s what makes me cry.

I get by with a little help from my friends.

I’m so lucky to have my friends. Last night Krazy Klara instantly decides we need to have a virtual girls’ night out (in?). There’s a video chat. I get on my laptop so it looks like the Brady Bunch, each of us in our own little square holding a drink. Klara is going nuts–she’s the true extrovert of us all, but we love her anyway. Scrubs in laying in bed because she’s on call. Veronica keeps disappearing to put her kids to bed, approximately 200 times. Hang in there Veronica! We group in Grover and we’re all happy to see her. She has a higher alcohol tolerance than Klara because she’s hitting the hard stuff without even slurring her words. Then we add in Kimpossible, who comes on and is like “Yeah, so what’s going on? Grover just texted me and said I needed to join this, but I’m not sure what I’m doing here.”

Also Kimpossible is the only one who still has a baby and she stood there with one of those wrap things and did this ninja Superman lollipop thing that made her baby stop crying and damn, where was she when I couldn’t figure that thing out?

Anyway, so we talked. And talked. About mediocre homeschooling. About needing personal space. About how considerate Klara’s father was for passing away last month so they could actually hold a memorial service for him. Some of us wore telemarketer headphones and informed the group that their conversation may be recorded for quality purposes. There may or may not have been a few tears.

Narrator: there were tears.

How are we going to do this without our friends? How am I going to do this without my friends? And yet we have this video chat technology. Is that going to get us through? I really hope so.