From Ms. Penny:
Several weeks ago I watched local author and speaker, Kelly Corrigan, talk about one way that she deals with overwhelming situations by imagining the best result. Kelly said, “I tell myself the story of what happened as if it’s over and I nailed it.” Her story of what the days of the pandemic “were” like, really made an impact in me, so I decided to write the story for our Pleasant Valley community, from the perspective of our lovely 5th graders. I hope you enjoy it and that it brings some hope to you as you look ahead.
Success Fantasy for Our Departing Pleasant Valley Eagles
It was abrupt. One day we were in class thinking about the 13 Colonies, attending Student Council Meetings and field trips to Taylor Mountain. The following Monday we were home, staring at our chrome books, trying to figure out how to make Zoom work. It was disorienting, looking at the screen, seeing the faces of classmates, so many voices and sounds coming from our speakers. It was exciting too.
We began each day with breakfast, no longer rushed, sometimes with the whole family. We got to see inside each other’s homes, a glimpse into bedrooms with posters on walls, dining tables with siblings in the background, back gardens with cheerful birds and breezes picked up by the microphones. Our pets were happiest of all because we showered them with attention. Walking the dog, once considered a chore, slowly became a welcome break in the day. We dreamed up funny ideas our pets might be having. Do they think it’s summer already? Is this the best ever? Does that cat secretly wish we would leave her alone? We adopted new pets into our family and gave them what we had in abundance to give: time.
Busy-ness stopped. Conversations, projects, games and imagination that we seemed to put off endlessly before became part of our daily lives. We sorted thorough pictures, older ones of mom dressed up for her Quinceanera, dad on his peewee football league. We learned that there have been hard, strange times before. We talked about 9/11 and Polio. We learned bad times happen and most of those bad things are temporary.
We began cooking. Everyone did. We baked like it was Christmas. Bread was never so fresh, dinnertime around the table, never so chatty. We did dishes every day, marveling that mom and dad used to do this too when they were our age. We actually had time to tend to our gardens. We planted flowers and peppers and strawberries. We watched things sprout. We put roses in vases and could smell them from across the room.
We quickly realized who the real heroes are. Appreciation for our teachers and schools became what it always should have been. We sent food and masks to nurses and doctors. We left snacks outside for our delivery people. We over-tipped for restaurant take-out. We stood outside every night and howled for them all, wishing we could help, so thankful for them that words weren’t enough.
We turned inward at first, holding tight to social media and online games. But over time, we wriggled free of their grip. We stopped closing our bedroom doors so much and walked into the living room and out the front door. We breathed deep because we could see that breathing was precious.
Our parents watched the news, then they didn’t, then they did again. Having the time to pay attention to big issues, people took to the streets to show what they cared about. The world was restless. Growth is hard. But the teachers reminded us that we can do hard things.
We put on masks, not only because the doctors said to, but also as a way to show we cared for those we loved and those we didn’t even know.
Some days were unimaginably extraordinary. It took effort to plan promotion ceremonies, which became all about families in cars and waving instead of walking to a stage or hugging. We looked at the faces of teachers as we drove by and saw in their eyes that they care. We felt loved.
We changed after coronavirus. We learned more during these days than was ever intended or could have been predicted. We stopped feeling like it didn’t matter what was happening on the other side of the world. We needed each other. We made decisions to change in ways that would help situations like this in the future. We added “Pandemic” to our list of things to prepare for. We decided that if we could endure this, we could also figure out how to pay people fairly, shelter who needed sheltering, provide care for the illnesses we did understand and only elect leaders who knew the first valuable lesson we learned in school – sharing.
We saw each other in a new light as stores and businesses began to re-open. We realized every person mattered. No life was just a number. No job was unimportant. No celebration or family get together or opportunity to listen to the symphony of different voices in a classroom would again be taken for granted.
We lived all these days together, though physically apart. We grew because we believed in each other. We believed we would be OK and we were.