This is certainly a very different (and sadly, more divided & divisive) July 4th than any that I can remember (and that's getting to be a big number, yikes), but here I be and here I go...
LOOKING BACK: JULY 4TH, 2010
We were all hip-deep in our semi-frantic preparations for the upcoming China trip to get the Pipsqueak when we realized, "Hey, there's a major holiday here!" It felt a little odd, knowing it was the last time it would be just "the four of us" going to watch the fireworks but at the same time it felt good to know that the goal that had seemed so far out of reach for so long was just days away. Gone was The Wait, gone was the litany of reasons to keep waiting patiently, gone was my panic attack at seeing photos of downtown Nanning -- where we were to meet the Pipsqueak -- under several feet of water. (A lovely lady named Marla, whose "Must Live A Life Less Ordinary" blog is now dormant, responded to my wailing about the latter in the Rumor Queen forums with a note that she & her family were just leaving Nanning with their newest family member and all was well... and they were scheduled to return Stateside on July 4th!)
Of course, there had to be a bug or three in the system... By now I'd been using the same pair of glasses almost as long as AJ had been paperchasing, and part of my personal preparations for China involved getting new glasses -- trying to read lots of instructions, lists, descriptions, etc. etc. etc. for the past several weeks had made it painfully obvious (quite literally painful in some cases) that my old prescription was just not gonna cut it anymore.
The result was a late June visit to my opthalmologist, followed by a quick visit to Costco for new glasses. I had picked them up the preceding Friday and wore them to work on Saturday... with sickening results. Y'see, I was working for IKEA at the time, up on the 2nd floor where the "ceiling" is actually just a big grid of metal beams painted bright white (the real ceiling is quite a bit above that and is dark grey, making the grid stand out even more). I don't know what made me put my old glasses in a case and put 'em in the side pocket of my cargo pants, but I was sure glad I did... I'd been having some problems adjusting to the new glasses and had just chalked it up to not being able to see clearly, but when I walked out onto the sales floor that overhead grid was so distorted -- a distortion that seemed to follow me as I walked, making its effect even stronger -- I had barely gone 50 feet before I had to sit down, close my eyes, and fight back a growing nausea. I swapped out my glasses and completed the shift comfortably (albeit slightly blurrily) in the old pair.
Desperate to find a fix to this major-league problem I went to a My Eye Doctor franchise near my house and explained my problem to the manager, including the fact that I was supposed to be on an airplane to China on the morning of July 9th. I gotta give the guy credit; he only stopped for a moment & blinked before saying, "We can do this, come with me!" He took me to the back of the store, pulled the staff optometrist (ironically a distractingly atrtractive young Chinese woman) from what she was doing and explained the problem to her. She put me through a fast but thorough exam, checked her data against my opthalmologist's prescription and the actual glasses, and figured out that I'd gone SO long without updating my prescription that my eyes & brain were going to need an extended period of time to adjust to the new lenses -- time I didn't have. We settled on a prescription roughly halfway between old & new, I chose a frame, and the manager reassured me he'd have my new glasses for me no later than the 7th.
So there I was, silently freaking out over maybe not being able to physically see anything in China as I helped cut up some watermelon for a picnic dinner at fireworks with my family on the 4th. We piled into AJ's SUV and -- after the requisite annual argument over which parking spot was the best -- settled into Lot 1 on the UMCP campus and chowed down on sandwiches & fruit. There was some construction going on, but the campus was still a comfortingly familiar place to AJ and me so we passed time by reminiscing over our adventures there until the streetlamps went out and we got the first thump - whoosh - BOOM! of the evening.
During the drive back home after the rousing finale and the usual traffic jams, we all talked quietly about what had to be done over the next few days and -- as I had begun doing every night before bed -- I reviewed our itinerary "just one more time" and scrolled around in Google Maps to be as prepared as I could be.
LOOKING AROUND: JULY 4TH, 2020
Gimme an O! Gimme a Y! Gimme a V! Gimme an E! Gimme another Y! What does that spell!?!
(Dude, take a deep breath... there ya go...)
We didn't know it at the time, but that last "just the four of us" round of July 4th fireworks was the last of any kind for a couple of years, since the Pipsqueak tended to catch pretty much any-and-every minor bug going around just in time to keep her increasingly perturbed Mommy from seeing her beloved fireworks until 2013. We've made a point of going to see the Indepndence Day fireworks in College Park every year since then, sometimes "just us" and sometimes with a bunch of friends...
...until this year, when the pandemic that's totally screwed up everything else also caused the celebration to be cancelled.
Yeah, there were other fireworks shows but we're all just too tired and too busy to figure out how to pile into a vehicle and find them. Not to mention that Dad's just a few days shy of 90, Mom's just a few days shy of 86, I'm well into my 61st year with both severe pneumonia & typhoid fever in my history, and AJ works in a nursing home that's already lost at least 17 residents to COVID-19... so we're all in high-risk groups and don't want to risk any more exposure than is absolutely necessary.
The result is that I'm sitting here at my dining room table with an occasional boom or bang in the distance but not really feeling like it's any kind of holiday in particular. (I've run outside with my camera 3 or 4 times, but only saw a few glimpses of the highest-flying shells in the distance over roofs or through the trees.) We're all dealing with some of the difficulties that come from close relatives who are fast approching the completion of nine decades of life and everyone is watching everyone like a hawk to ensure good physical, mental, and emotional health in the middle these (very) trying times.
I'm trying to complete my medical coding & billing certification (and continue to mysteriously fail to even qualify for part time work in fields where I have exeperience -- it sucks to be looking for work at 61 when so many younger people are doing the same thing) while working on a couple of personal projects and trying to keep the days of the week straight. AJ is working insane hours, and has spent quite the chunk of change on scrubs, special shoes, etc. so she can minimize how many viruses she might inadvertently bring home while simultaneously developing permanent marks from the mask & goggles required at her job. Mom & Dad are basically just trying to figure some things out while making sure they're being as supportive as possible.
And the Pipsqueak? Well, she's experiencing some of the same problems as millions of other kids in her age group... She adapted quickly to virtual school online but went from merely not liking it to really hating it (and still finished 5th grade with straight A's for the year!) and is not-so-quietly obsessing over starting middle school next semester. (Mom remembers all too well AJ's similar worries at the same age, so at least we have practice dealing with it, LOL.) The intensely-shortened season for the competitive dance team, as well as just plain ol' dance lessons, ended a week ago with online classes via Zoom actually working out pretty well -- plus there was a drive-by session outside the studio where the kids could pick up the costumes that had been ordered for all the (now cancelled) competitions along with their photos & trophies, along with "special award" medals from the studio.
Miri also seems to have gotten a handle on all the feelings of aloneness & abandonment related to her adoption that had been brought bubbling to the surface by the isolation from her friends. The subject still comes up in conversation from time to time, but the emotional force behind the issues isn't the same overwhelming force it seemed to be a few weeks ago. I think part of it is due to her finding new ways to adapt to the pandemic-related isolation, part is due to her finding new ways to deal with her feelings, part is due to her being able to express herself & vent as needed when it gets to be too much... and part (hopefully a small one) is probably due to her submerging it again into that mixmaster in her mind where she tends to churn & analyze things before bringing them back up to share.
The usual end-of-season dance recital that Miri looks forward to every year has been postponed (with fingers crossed) to December; her elementary school held a drive-by "pick up all your personal stuff" day about a week ago so she & AJ were able to retrieve everything left in her cubby (remember, the shutdown was originally only supposed to last two weeks) along with some of her artwork, etc. Now she's participating in an online "virtual summer camp" run by Toby's Dinner Theatre several days each week, and hasn't stopped raving about how much fun she's having with it. In fact, she's even mentioned that she intends to keep taking dance lessons... but is kinda-sorta wondering about not trying out for the dance team and picking up something for acting & performing instead... (Considering how AJ & I were both involved in dance and/or theater in school, plus the number of our cousins who are/were professionally involved with theater, I think this is another case of what Dad calls "genetics via osmosis"...!)
Oh, and the Pipsqueak has finally discovered the world of Harry Potter. As in, she hasn't stopped talking about it, asking about it, re-telling the story, and complaining about how difficult it is to wait a whole week between watching each moviesvia On Demand. Of course, AJ and I are having an absolute blast answering all her questions about various characters & events with, "We had to wait an entire YEAR to find out, so you'll have to wait until next week!" She calls it torture, we call it entertaining. We've also been pleasantly surprised at how Miri is devouring the books one after another -- she's usually only interested in historical fiction or historical accounts (think "Johnny Treamaine" and Anne Frank's diary). It's good to see her reading more and spending less time watching "Dance Moms" or "Five Minute Crafts" videos on YouTube. (Note: "Five Minute Crafts" is absolute garbage; about 95% of the "crafts" and "hacks" they teach do NOT work and are actually staged. Avoid like the plague.)
LOOKING FORWARD...
Well, Independence Day was kind of a wash... the annual visit by the New York cousins was pushed back but is now likely to just be cancelled... our annual week at the beach has been cancelled... the county keeps making announcements that they're going to announce how they think schools will operate this coming semester and that they'll make the announcement when they have a decision to announce... in short, there just isn't anything we're looking forward to (or trying to look forward to) that we can nail down in terms of "if," "when," "how," or even "where" beyond a "maybe" and a shrug.
The whole world is very different from how it was ten years ago today, and I have to admit that I find it far too easy to go down the rabbit hole of how much more negative things seem to be (in so many ways!) compared to back then. In 2010, we were tired but filled with hope and the expectation of a new life adventure for us all with the at-long-last addition of the Pipsqueak to the family; in 2020 we're just tired and steadily growing more so whilst stalking toilet paper & hand sanitizer in stores and decent-quality surgical masks online. It's gotten to the point where I have my fingers crossed... and my eyes crossed... and my toes crossed... and possibly even my pancreas crossed... BUT we are all still in this together and I get to spend time with my niece at least a couple of days each week with the knowledge that ten years ago she was still just an abstraction in my future, much like many of my present-day plans.
So it's all a bit difficult, all a bit rough... but it's all still good. I'll see y'all here again in a few days to look back at AJ and I actually setting foot in China -- and until then, y'all stay healthy, okay? Okay!
No comments:
Post a Comment