Self Quarantine Begins

It started out as a nice little Sunday…

Kate picked me up from the airport on Saturday night around 6pm. I was greeted with a smile and a bottle of Purell which she immediately squirted into my palms. Mom had told me they (Kate, Alex and my niece Hazel) had decided to self quarantine them..selves… with me. Which really is the only way to do it considering I am staying with them. BTW this quarantine situation is not because I have come in contact with anyone with COVID-19 (that I know of), but it is strongly encouraged by the Canadian government that anyone coming from out of country quarantine themselves for 14 days to ensure they are symptom free. Some people don’t really get it. It didn’t even really sink in for us right away. As we were driving home and talking about this crazy world I asked what was up for dinner and Kate said “leftover Thai food”, which made me drool and sadden all at once. I fucking love Thai food, but am currently 7 weeks into a 3 month elimination diet I am doing to help determine some gut issues (TMI? whatever it’s my blog), and basically can’t eat anything.
“Can we stop at a Save On and I’ll run in and get a chicken?” I asked.
“You can’t. You are quarantined.”
“Right.”
”I guess I could run in?”
We hadn’t even hugged yet so we decided this was OK. I sat in the car watching a man in a mask bring three separate loads of toilet paper to his SUV (seriously, what is up with all the TP people?). We went home and had a lovely Sunday dinner - I haven’t been back in Van since Christmas and was planning to come home in May, so it felt alright to be home (a month and a half early…). We talked about what the next two weeks might look like with Kate and Alex working from home and Hazel being out of daycare. I said I would help out as much as possible. We cheers’d. “Here’s hoping we don’t all kill each other” Kate said, and then quickly realized what she had said and we all nervously laughed… tomorrow would be the real test.

Day 1:
Kate came into my room around 8:30am already quite stressed. My bed is in her office so it was up and at em. I made tea and tried to keep Hazel’s attention. She is a full blown human now and it is weirding me out. She uses words like “difficult” and “beautiful” and is obsessed with the Frozen soundtrack, which I guess is now just an inevitable part of being a toddler. With some colouring and a giant book of stickers we were able to get through breakfast without distracting mom and dad. The weather was unreal (sunny and cold) and is supposed to be all week (grateful), so we went for a walk. When we came back Alex was in a bit of a panic. He received a text message with some information about Canada imminently shutting down all businesses/storefronts beyond pharmacies, grocery stores and medical facilities like much of Europe has done. Being quarantined, we had put in an order for groceries to be delivered Sunday night, but they wouldn’t arrive until Tuesday, and this text was advising to stock up for 6 weeks! Trudeau was about to speak so we all gathered around Kate’s computer sitting on my bed and watched.

False alarm. We are not quite at that stage, but I do foresee it happening in the next few days, and I’m all about it. We need to be proactive - nobody wants to be in Italy’s shoes right now (my heart goes out to you beautiful Italians). But Alex was still panicked and promptly left to gas up Kate’s car. Then we were notified our grocery order was cancelled. The website had crashed. After much deliberation we made the decision that Kate would go out with gloves and mask to buy groceries. Please note we are taking this self quarantine extremely seriously, keeping a minimum 4 ft distance with people, avoiding parks and playgrounds, and having no in person social engagements beyond each other. She came home with a haul. Apparently all of the frozen foods, meat, and toilet paper (obvi) were gone but there was lots of produce, which I was stoked on because that’s pretty much all I’m eating right now. She stocked up on pasta, rice and some canned goods and I began ricing cauliflower to freeze… I realize if this worsens I made need to drop the diet but the girl’s committed for now! We heard news of Alberta and Saskatchewan closing down schools until the fall, San Francisco ordering all non-essential stores to close and residents to stay in their homes, LA doing the same. I have obviously been checking in on my friends in Nashville on the regular. Yesterday Mayer Cooper advised bars on Broadway to close their doors and received some push back. I saw several Insta stories of bars and streets packed on Sunday night as if nothing is going on. Terrifying. Today Broadway was shut down, thank god, but restaurants, coffee shops and other bars around town are still open for business as usual. Friends please do not wait for your government to mandate a shut down - you are smarter than them. Stay home now.

Hazel, seemingly unfazed by it all, went to her room to play. I put in a podcast and reorganized the freezer, fridge and pantry taking inventory of everything we had. This is fucking strange. Crazy really. How do you prepare for something like this? I am stressed about having no work or means of income right now, but Kate and Alex also found it very stressful to try and focus on work with all of this going on. Nothing really feels like it matters. I am trying to find solace in the idea that no one is unaffected by this - we are all in it together and no one knows how to navigate it. We do have four survival kits on hand… everything you need to survive for 48 hours. Kate and Alex made them for the whole fam a few Christmas’s ago (pretty rad gift idea - please steal for yourself). I want to laugh at the idea of needing them, but had you told me last week I would be taking inventory of the kitchen pantry I would’ve rolled my eyes at you, yet here we are… we will see what tomorrow brings.