Brilliant … But Bouncy

I’ll Lose a Year of My Life.

After a New York Times article blew the roof off the misperception that college life isn’t likely to be normal in the fall, I couldn’t help but forward it to Dylan.

Having lived through four years of college myself – a time which was irreplaceable in making me who I am – I’ve been wondering if Dylan shouldn’t … maybe … take a gap year now.

So I forwarded the article to him, along with the following note:

Think about this: the time that you’ve been home since spring break is LESS than the time you will be at school – the difference being, you will be at school with 8,000 other students, none of whom are wearing masks (or required to) – AND you will not be able to have band practice, or choral practice, or even audition for an a cappella group. You won’t be able to volunteer for stuff, or meet with any clubs, or try Ultimate Frisbee. You won’t be getting to know new people; you’ll be lucky to see the people in your own class.

And classes are likely to all be online – which means you will be stuck in your dorm (no guarantees that you’ll be able to visit other dorm rooms) on your computer for every class. You will be in the caf three times a day – it would be insane to travel off campus to go get fast food, especially given the city’s disregard for regulations. There won’t be any hanging out in the dorm lobby, but you might get to socially distance outside. Except you won’t see anyone else social distancing, because they won’t care. They will think, “I’m not sick.” And eventually you will believe that, too, and you’ll stop doing what it takes to stay healthy.

Worst of all, you will completely miss a WHOLE YEAR of the four best years of your life, because it’s not going to be as good as it should be. You’ll be locked away from all the fun that college has to offer.

Please seriously consider taking a gap year.

Dylan’s (lengthy, thought-provoking) response wasn’t enthusiastic about gap years. His friends will be at college, and they’re all going back. His age group is unlikely to die from coronavirus. He feels confident – like most teenagers do – that he’s invincible. And he’s volunteered to self-quarantine when he comes home, so as not to give anything to the rest of his family.

My favorite – and most influential – line from Dylan’s texts about his decision is this one:

“Maybe I’ll lose a year of what college has the potential to be, but if I stay here with everything on hold, I’ll lose a year of my life.”

Well said, Son. Profound, mature – and correct.

No gap year, again, for Dylan.

And for once in his life, I am ready to trust him to do the right thing.

So What About School…?

No one is really talking about it now, but there really aren’t any plans for Shane – and the rest of the county’s public school system – to return to school this fall.

They are assuming that kids will go back; everyone wants things to return to normal by September. The calendar is still posted. It’s still a matter under discussion.

But it doesn’t seem likely to me, as states – including ours – reopen. Coronavirus cases are spiking since Memorial Day all over the country. There’s a possible “side ailment” that affects kids, popping up in New York City, seemingly related to COVID.

Germany was the gold standard for what to do and how to do it, at least when the virus first started making its way around the world. But even Germany is having trouble since reopening – serious trouble. But their kids are testing themselves at home – imagine! – and proceeding to school without masks if they test negative.

And what about what happened in Korea? The country that did its best to track and trace, keeping folks healthy or home – until some guy went to a nightclub – suddenly had cases spike again. Korea opened cautiously, with social distancing and masks in place. And then hundreds of schools closed again, because their children were at risk.

So when my county executive sent an email claiming that we’re now starting phase two of reopening, I silently decided that we will not be going to the capacity-conscious swimming pools this summer. We won’t be shopping in our local malls. Nor will we be heading to our local movie theater, even though we’ll have two seats between our group and the next one. (What about the people coughing and sneezing directly behind us?)

We won’t be doing any indoor dining, either, no matter how limited the capacity. We won’t go to the beach, which seems like a great idea – but is overflowing with people already.

So what about school in two months? Will Shane be able to have a junior year? Will classes start on time? Will they be online? Will school buildings be open? Will Shane even meet his teachers in person?

We’ll just have to wait and see.

And I’m okay with that. I am in no hurry.

He’s Learning to Organize His Time.

Dylan took two classes during “Maymester.”

While he was originally supposed to be taking classes as he traveled through Italy, he switched his schedule around to get some graduation requirements completed.

The term was only three weeks long. For Dylan, this was a good thing. He only had to stay “caught up” for 20 days. And since his worst thing is procrastination, maybe it taught him how not to procrastinate.

Well – a little. His final paper is due in two days, and he still hasn’t written it.

At least it might give him a sense of accomplishment, so that he realizes how much easier life is when it’s taken one piece at a time.

After the first two weeks, he was breaking up his work and setting goals for himself for each day. On weekends, he felt like he deserved to take breaks – but he needed that time to do whatever work he hadn’t done during the week. So he goofed off for hours and hours, with the thought looming in the back of his brain that his work wasn’t done yet.

I know people who still live like this. I don’t know how they survive.

Still, it’s fun watching Dylan. He’s not only grown up this year, but he’s actually learning to organize his time. A few days ago, he wrote a whole page of his paper.

It’s not so fun when I decide to “remind” him about his classwork.

“I got this, Mom,” he says – as nicely as possible. Translation: just leave me alone!

Compare this to high school, when I would “remind” him about his classwork. He would practically roar at me: “I DON’T NEED YOUR HELP!”

But for Dylan, time organization is the most important thing he needs to learn in his lifetime. His time can be so disorganized, in spite of my efforts, that he completely forgets that he’s supposed to do anything at all.

Fortunately, he really wants to stay in college.

Dylan’s not a pro yet, and he may never do it the way I do – which is fine. But he’s growing up and learning that he’s capable of getting through things, one step at a time.

Now. If he would just finish that paper.

There Was Never Any Time Before.

The thing about staying at home, having no schedule, skipping vacations is: everything I once ignored is now magnified and impossible to ignore.

For example, our 16-year-old stained carpet became unbearable. Along with it, the obnoxious (also 16-year-old) paint colors on our walls became … obnoxious. The cheap vinyl floors we’d chosen for our toddlers became embarrassing.

I don’t really care about appearances. But when we canceled our vacation and Bill suggested we spend our vacation money to fix up the house, we ended up with new paint, carpet and floors: the equivalent of a new house.

We did all of it with extreme gratitude that Bill had a job. And then we reorganized and prepared to donate a full room’s worth of stuff which, hopefully, we’ll be able to donate soon.

But fixing the house isn’t the only result of this pandemic: I’m noticing everything. For the first time in forever, I pay attention to the weather: the temperature, the clouds, the extreme green of spring. I am conscious of the birds, the squirrels, the rabbits, the deer in a new way. Outdoor life is even more precious to me now.

I’ve got vegetables growing in pots on the porch, and I check on them daily. Last year, our tomato plants were virtually ignored and didn’t do well. This year, I have seen every new sprout as it pops.

There was never any time before to notice things.

Dylan and Shane, too, have taken on new ventures. Shane has started researching subjects other than amusement parks, and he’s gotten better at Jeopardy. He’s started a regular workout routine, and he’s drumming again. He’s revamping his whole room for the first time ever.

Dylan has been working on new music. He and Shane just released an online album of comedic songs – some with real potential. They each wrote their own lyrics; some songs are quite funny. They spent almost as much time naming the band as they did recording their songs. The result is an album called Reverse Psychology by their band, Glass of Milk.

Dylan not only finished spring semester, he took additional online courses in May. With those complete, he – like many others – became enraged about police brutality and the racism in this country. But Dylan didn’t protest – we’re still in an area that’s barely open. Instead, he deleted all of his social media app’s. This gave him more time to do everything and he’s been hanging out with us, and doing more productive things, ever since.

Both boys have started bicycling again, although Shane really started the movement. After dinner, Shane would say, “I’m going out for a spin,” and disappear for an hour. After Dylan deleted his app’s, he started biking with Shane. They go so often, in fact, that I’ve had to walk the dog all by myself.

This is fine, since the weather is glorious, and I’m spending quality time with Loki, who is still learning how to belong with people. And of course, there’s the high value of being outside.

In fact, life is more precious to me now. I am so aware that we’re lucky, that we’re alive, that we’re healthy. I am so aware that what matters is more than grades or jobs. Nothing else matters when there’s a threat to health.

What matters most is family. I miss my job. I miss vacations, restaurants, movies. I miss being able to just sit and talk with my friends. But as a family, we are making the most of our time together.

And that’s simply beautiful.

What Will Campus Look Like?

Dylan’s college emailed its students: We need to know if you’re going to live on campus in the fall.

I understand why they need to know; their task is an impossible one. Still, this is an impossible choice. To what would we send Dylan back?

I wrote this letter in response:

My son is trying to decide how to answer the survey about fall residency. It makes sense that you need to know now, so that you can move on with plans for the fall, to figure out campus life in this impossible situation. I don’t envy your work!

But we, too, are stuck now. Between the protests and the beginnings of reopening, some of us are hunkered down awaiting the second wave of COVID-19. College football teams that decided to practice have had players test positive already, for example. You know all of this; I don’t need to preach to the choir.

In spite of the uncertainty, we need to make a decision now. We would LOVE to send my son back to college in the fall and have him live with his new roommates, eat at the cafeteria, play in his band, and play frisbee in the grass. He wanted to audition for an a cappella group, and he’d thought about being in a choir. But who knows if ANY of that will be safe?

And what will campus look like? What are we deciding, exactly? It’s unfair to ask us if we’re coming back when we have absolutely no idea to WHAT the students are coming back. Can you answer any of these questions, even in a vague way?

* Will students be required to stay in their dorm rooms when not in class?
* Will there be a mask requirement? (Where we live, you can’t leave the house without a mask; it is not that way in your city.)
* Will there be choirs and a cappella groups?
* Will bands be allowed to practice in the dorms?
* What measures will be put in place at the cafeteria? 
* Will it be grab-and-go, or sit-and-eat?
* Will all classes be online or will students still be in the classrooms? And how will we know who will be doing what?

Perhaps most importantly for parents: can a student take a “gap year” until this blows over, or even a semester off, WITHOUT losing scholarships and financial aid?

My son desperately wants to go back and be with his friends. We ALL want a sense of normalcy again. But given that we have no idea when the second wave will be, OR what Belmont is planning to do to combat that second wave, this is an absolutely impossible decision to make without at least some idea of campus plans for the fall living situation.

Please, whatever you can tell us would be helpful.

My son said to me last night, “I’m not worried about me getting it; I think I’ll be fine. I’m worried about giving it to someone I love.” He’s got a father past retirement age, two grandparents who live very close, and a mother with an autoimmune disorder. What on earth do we tell him?

The provost wrote back immediately – which is astounding – and said that his own son goes to Belmont and lives on campus.

That was enough for me.

Sophomore Year is Officially Over.

Yesterday we had a new experience: drive-thru yearbook pickup.

Shane’s school organized a two-day book return for kids whose textbooks were at home. Everyone wore masks; students and parents had to remain in their cars.

One might think that this would be a huge, exciting time with a line of cars waiting around the block. But no: we pulled right up. A masked staff member came out and took the book, and took his name off the list.

Shane only had one book for his seven classes. Considering it wasn’t an English book, this concerned me. But they didn’t seem surprised. Things are different than they were when I was young! We had to read those books all the time. Nowadays: not so much.

In exchange for his AP Gov book, Shane was able to pick up his yearbook. They have been doing an online signing app throughout the school, and hopefully people have signed Shane’s yearbook.

We waved goodbye to the nice lady and drove around the corner to the drama section of the parking lot. Since there was only a week left – Tech Week, in fact – before the play, all the students got their Hairspray cast and crew t-shirts.

This year, some wonderful soul decided to list the names of all the students involved on the backs of the shirts. This was such a touching gesture, especially for the seniors, who will never get to perform Hairspray as expected.

Shane also picked up his clothes – costume items for the various parts that he played – and was dismayed to tell me about the hot pink jumpsuit he’d been planning to wear, but that I would never see.

Then, more quickly than we’d come, Shane and I left the parking lot. We took off our masks, got out our hand sanitizer, and chatted a bit on the way home. It was fast – too fast for a year filled with sophomore experiences.

But Shane was just as happy to go home.

Sophomore year is officially over for him. Shane has finished every assignment, and has fantastic grades again – but he will just get a “pass” for the quarter. This, of course, will mean he’s getting straight A’s this semester – which is stupendous.

Now we just have to worry about next year: how it will be, where it will be, what it will be.

Everything about school is going to be tough for awhile, I think.

I Am No Expert.

I’m old; I was born years before Martin Luther King, Jr.’s dream speech. I was born ten years after desegregation became law, but long before anyone decided to change anything.

My young adulthood occurred in Pittsburgh which, as a city, should have been substantially more desegregated even then.

When I moved to D.C. in my late twenties, I had no idea how different things would be. I moved into a melting pot. I moved into an area of the world that was not segregated.

The D.C. area is hugely overpopulated with people from every corner of the world. After my lily-white formative years, D.C. is a rainbow.

While it takes awhile to get used to the phoneme differences, it takes no time at all to realize that people are the same inside, no matter what they look like on the outside.

As if that were ever a question.

In my kids’ schools, whites were a minority – and we live in the suburbs. Three miles closer to D.C., it’s rare to see a white face in the classroom. Less than half the population of my kids’ elementary school is white; besides Blacks, Hispanics and Asians make up much of the balance.

My kids grew up with members of every race, color and creed. Their friends’ ancestors came from everywhere. No one ever told them “white is better.” It’s simply not true; they could see that with their own eyes.

They didn’t see color unless it was purposefully noted, like when they did West Side Story on stage and had to figure out who fit into the Sharks and who fit into the Jets. They laughed because it was so crazy, trying to figure out who was “white enough” and who was “Hispanic enough.”

Frequent travels have reminded me that racism is rampant in the U.S. Living in a racially diverse area provides a magnifying glass, of sorts, to show what happens when people stay segregated.

The ignorance is overwhelming. And I don’t mean stupidity; I mean lack of knowledge. People who haven’t lived in this kind of melting pot simply don’t know what it’s like. I don’t mean everyone elsewhere is racist; it’s just easier to stay stuck if you’re living in a segregated society.

It took me a few weeks, maybe months, to get used to the variety of humans here. But now it’s NORMAL. It’s good and right and perfect, just as God intended. But those who haven’t lived it – they just don’t know how combat their own feelings of instant judgement.

Still, I am no expert. I judge people instantly for other things: body language, voice tone, the way they treat their kids. I am constantly guilty of judging based on appearance.

But because I am less ignorant than I used to be, I’d like to say I understand, that I have empathy.

But I don’t know if I can. I haven’t felt the sharp edge of prejudice, unless you count the kind that comes from being a woman.

Come to think of it, I’ve had plenty of that. That sucks.

Still, I feel like nothing I can do will be enough. Living here isn’t enough. Raising my kids right isn’t enough. But what is enough? And what about protesting in the middle of a pandemic – is that smart? Where I live, I think it’s still a bad idea.

So what can I do? For now, I will be aware of my own judgements, and work on eliminating those. It’s a step.

I Feel Ashamed.

We were dirt poor when I was young, and I moved a lot. But everywhere I lived, the neighborhood was lily-white.

In 7th grade, identical twin boys joined my class. Their names were Rod and Roddy – short for Roderick and Rodney – and they moved into our small town outside of Baltimore.

It’s cool, especially when you’re 12, to see two people who look exactly alike. Rod and Roddy were funny, too. Also, they were black – the only black kids in the school.

Back then, people with dark skin were called “black.”

My late friend, Pete, once said to me, “I didn’t come from Africa; I’m not African-American. I’m black. White people made up that term, and they weren’t talking about me.”

In Pete’s honor, I rarely use the term “African American” unless I’m referring to an American who hails from Africa.

So the 7th grade twins were black. The next time I remember seeing blacks in school was in 12th grade, in a suburb of Pittsburgh.

That was when they demolished a dilapidated inner city school – one that had been 99% black – and forced its occupants to be bussed into various predominantly white schools. No one was happy being bussed out of their own neighborhoods – but I didn’t even think about that until Tyrone, whose locker was next to mine, said, “I don’t want to be here! None of us wants to be here!”

When I left Pittsburgh more than a decade later, I had still been living in a mostly white neighborhood, hanging out with mostly white people. But I met my friend, Pete, in Pittsburgh – and later we both (separately) moved to Washington, D.C. and kept in touch.

Pete taught me a lot about what it’s like to be a black man in American society. While giddily prepping for my vacation, I would announce, “I’m going to Myrtle Beach!” And Pete would say, “I’ll never step foot in South Carolina again. I stay out of the South.”

Pete didn’t have to say much to make his point.

Before that, it never occurred to me that South Carolina was “The South.” In fact, the only thing I knew is that they ate grits in The South, and I didn’t like grits. So when grits appeared on a menu, I knew I was in “The South.”

But no one ever threatened my life for walking into their restaurant.

I will never really know the depth of Pete’s fear, of his pain, of his anger. I will never know because in my life, I lived free. I am still living free.

But now – especially since my awareness has been put on high alert – I don’t feel free.

I feel ashamed. I’m ashamed to have spent my life in ignorance, not knowing what it’s really like to be black in this country. I’m ashamed that I didn’t ask Pete more about that before he died.

And I’m ashamed that I’m one of those white people who gets outraged and then gets quiet.

I don’t want that to happen again; I don’t want to get quiet.

I’ve always taught my kids that they should do what they think is right. Maybe they can’t change the whole world, but they can change their little part of the world. They can be kind and caring and speak up whenever they can. So I want to do that, too.

I just don’t know what to say, or do, to make any of this any better at all.