A colleague today posted on an internal Slack channel that her daughter is in school for the first time this year, and she’s looking at the summer wondering what happens now. She is too old for childcare, but she’s also too young to stay home and not be a huge draw on my colleague’s time, energy, and productivity. She doesn’t want to keep the child at home, babysat by TV, she can’t take that much time off work. She doesn’t know if camps or summer programs are even a thing. What’s a parent to do? A few others have been struggling with doing their own jobs while they are helping their own kids connect to zoom classes or build marshmallow structures or, yaknow, math.

I was thinking about how hard that must be, since my kid comes and goes as he pleases – he sets his own schedule for sleeping and eating breakfast (or not), and attending his classes, and making sure his kit is pressed for zoom meetings with his Sergeant (or the Commandant of the school). He’s fully self-sufficient. Still COVID brought lessons to the Casa di Swears. How well do we do (or don’t do) at home for days and weeks and months? What does health means in this new world order? How can we manage our stress so that we can manage the rest of the lessons COVID has on offer. So I’ve said to myself, Self, you should develop a night-time ritual so that you can sleep more restfully. I want to do more yoga to help with the creeping anxiety, but Yoga Before Bed is directly contraindicated by No Technology Before Bed.  So I’ll have to prioritize, right? But priorities are hard. And decisions are too, and maybe I should just binge watch some Guillermo Del Toro so that I am right and fully screwed for a restful night’s sleep. Or, spend an extra hour or two trying to cobble together a Lent Reflection post when it’s just not coming together.

*sigh*

Some days, shutting down the technology is most important to my night ritual. Sometimes the yoga is. And that’s OK. Maybe somedays both are, and I can do a flow from memory or from a magazine. 

This Lent, may I have the clarity to see the greatest need, and may I choose the greater good.

Extra Credit:

I’ve created landing pages for the last 2 years of Lent Project. You can access them from the Reflections Projects option in the menu bar. Happy reading, friends!