/data/universe/

Stasis is the status these days.  Somehow we’re halfway through May, and only the later sunsets provide any sign of change.  We have found a routine, mostly, and while every few days the kids need a new diversion they have mostly accepted our new rhythms.  Gratefully the kindergartner is not fighting school so hard, and has finally started to pick up a little reading.

Things happen, of course–or maybe more accurately, things don’t happen.  Heartbreakingly, we had to tell my brother we didn’t think it was prudent to fly to his wedding in July.  Plenty to second guess there, but going to the airport feels like going to the moon right now.  I got my first haircut at home.  Summer camps are out.  More conferences are cancelled, now in the fall.  Academics are starting to embrace virtual colloquia.  Seattle schools are sending surveys about “alternate learning approaches” for the fall.

This heartbreaking article compares how politicians and public health officials in Seattle cooperated–and those in New York tragically did not.  It shows how persuading Microsoft and Amazon to send its workers home early–and keeping schools open late–helped establish public acceptance of the drastic measures needed.  The implications of our failure to establish similar messaging nationally are left to the reader…

The depressing fact is that the US lockdowns failed to suppress the epidemic–but other countries have succeeded.

Nevertheless, restrictions are being relaxed, even here, as we learn more about the spectrum of risks.

There’s still plenty to be mad about, but I feel like I am saturated on anger and have moved into resignation.

But we have had an unusually pleasant spring, it’s light past 9:00 pm now–so there’s time for a bike ride or some work in the yard after the kids are in bed.  And so we continue onward.