I learned it in quarantine...

[Lark]

Have you been working from home or even shielding during the pandemic so far? How have you used the time? Have you used it to learn a new skill or further develop an old one? If you havent how do you feel about that? If you have would you have been inclined towards developing new habits, self-improvement or learning new things anyway or was it something that you just found you could fill the time with?

Finally, do you think that being formally unoccupied during quarantine will have been a net gain or loss for the average person and for society?

 

[Maou]

Everything about quarintine and corona had not affected my life that much besides wearing a mask, and food availability. However, I was lucky. I am an essential worker, didn't work at home at all. So I didn't need help surviving bill wise. However, my hours were cut, and I was only working 3 days a week for the initial lockdown. I about lost my mind having to sit around and do nothing all day besides chores. None of the new things I could do, were indoor activities except my garden.

Net loss, hands down. Not everyone is an Introverted intellectual.

 

[ceecee]

I was laid off due to not being able to service union members since all of them work in a hospital or nursing home - no entry. So I was doing some work from home for a political consulting group part time. The money is good and the hours even better but the contract expires at the end of August. My husband always works from home unless he is traveling to insured facilities and that's being done virtually so...

In the last 4 months we have;

Painted bedrooms, completed laundry room (there was nothing in there other than the washer and dryer - no shelves or cupboards were ever installed by the builder or previous owner). Also had sprinkler system installed and completed the landscaping.

Started a garden and installed small greenhouse. I've done several succession planting crops already and will be planting fall crops and grow bags for the greenhouse in August. This is by far the best thing I learned in quarantine. Thank you You Tube.

I did a lot of mutual aid coordinating and I'm still doing that - it requires administration and organization to run efficiently. I've also met great people and groups, not every American is a hyper-individual - I got mine so fuck you - but a whole lot of them are. The upside is that more people see how this is not a way to function in any kind of society, especially if they had not thought about it previously.

I think being formally unoccupied will show to be a net gain for many people. I don't think this is the case for parents forced to work from home and be teacher to their kids, essential employees working in unsafe and unconcerned industries and health care workers who will never get a break due to the breathtaking stupidity and inability of so many Americans to even be slightly inconvenienced or take precautions of any kind.

Being introverted has really been an advantage for me. Aside from the projects and chores that needed to be done around my house, I was happy to simply do what I thought was productive, not productivity prescribed by anyone else. That entire WASP work ethic is a malignancy on this country, add neoliberalism and what is happening now is no surprise. The upside is that many more people are questioning the "busy" fetish in this country like never before. Good.

 

[FemMecha]

I'm trying to get recordings uploaded as albums on CDBaby and also re-upload scores to amazon. I am also trying to practicing singing, dancing, and instrument practice, but that isn't logging as many hours as I'd like because I haven't been feeling well. I either have sudden *severe allergy symptoms or possible coronavirus symptoms. I feel urgency to have all my work in the public perhaps in case I do get sicker during this time. I don't have any other projects except I want to keep my musical skills and would like to transform myself into feeling like a real dancer, but I keep disappointing myself. I did participate in a montage video though.

Besides that I just play with my cats, watch comedies, eat ice cream treats and drink spiked spritzers and go on walks before other people are up and about.

I've also learned that I'm okay with this lifestyle except I wish I was with my soulmate. I am happier in a real relationship and am a very physical person. I compensate by doing the other physical activities all day. I may go live remotely in the forest and continue this basic lifestyle when this is over.

 

[laintpe]

I only had to WFH for 3 days during the initial uncertainty and then was back at work. If anything, after that I was slower with finishing my masters, but it's done now. Since then I've found wayyy more programs and certificates that are available online due to COVID, including one in architecture which is tempting but probably not worth it for the cost. Doubled down on nonprofit online/phone PR tasks. Started exercising again. Otherwise nothing really changed.

 

[Tomb1]

I did not take a hit money wise... I took a hit in terms of losing momentum and having to work from home. probably made me more gruff and abrasive in my business dealings with people -- all of which occurred on the phone.

I had my girl here the whole time so there was a never a dull moment (she's a big time sx/sp) and plenty of sex... she also kept on top of the food, cleaning, laundry which was her choice (i would go out and pay for all that stuff, but she likes to contribute in that manner because she's weirdly obsessed with doing whatever she can to help keep my expenses down)

I bought a car in the midst of the pandemic off a private seller on craigslist....2010 Dodge Challenger RT only 40k miles (worked a sweet deal), one owner who passed away and the family kept it garaged for years. I drove out to see and test-drive it and then told him I'd be back the next morning with cash. I went to the bank the next day and they asked me a bunch questions....I"m like, it's my money, you just give me whatever I ask for. Boom, went there later that day, sold, score

My parents/aunt & uncle own a house with a huge driveway and live closer to the stateline, so after my mother said sure and I lowered their expectations about what to expect (hadn't seen them in months), I had the car towed (flatbed) back into the state and dropped off on their driveway where I then parked it. They also had all been cooped up in there for weeks/months...so when they saw that beautiful muscle car with chrome rims being dropped off into their driveway everybody was pretty excited (it was a novelty), like the sun had finally come out after weeks of rain...against the backdrop of the quarantine it was a marvelous show of strength

I had to wait and wait for an apt. at DMV so it remained parked there for awhile ('cept once I had it towed out to the mechanic for an oil change and overall tune-up and then towed back)...finally got it registered/inspected no problem. My instincts turned out right....there wasn't even a slight mechanical issue

 

[Julius_Van_Der_Beak]

I lucked out by getting a job offer just before lockdown started. They were able to arrange for me to work from home. I just signed a lease this week so I can finally move. My new place has a kickass view that I'm super excited about.

It seems to me that society does learn, if more slowly than an individual can. What will society learn from this? I'm just fascinated to watch how things will unfold over the next few years. This is going to be a change on the level of 9/11, maybe even bigger. I think it will have a positive effect in the long run, if not, unfortunately, in the short term. I think this situation has really exposed the weaknesses of our current system (which was supposed to be this perfect thing that couldn't be improved) to everyone (or at least, everyone who isn't brainwashed).

Leave it to me to be a pessimist when everyone is optimistic and an optimist when everyone is a pessimist.

 

[Red Herring]

I took a huge hit financially as my turnover volume dropped by 75-80%. Luckily the state I live in provided for its freelancers meaning I received an amount for the three lockdown months that was lower than my usual income but double what a normal welfare payment would have been. My SO is a substitute teacher and landed a job shortly before schools closed. So he got paid for doing very little, now for supervising small classes and stuff like making sure kids social distance during recess.

Many people decribe the lockdown as a time of having too much time on their hand. For us (and especially for me as I work from home anyway and he left for work again as soon as schools reopened) it was a time of never being alone, never having a few minutes to myself. Since kindergarden and daycare closed in march and didn't reopen until the end of june that means that I had two little kids to look after 24/7 for over three months. It's a good thing I had so little work because I would have had to work at night while the kids sleep anyway. In fact I often did exactly that. Lockdown was a time of too little sleep, constant physical and mental exhaustion and not enough alone time. Even playgrounds were closed and it was illegal to meet other families for playdates. We also had to postpine our wedding.

On top of that a member of our household tested positive for Covid-19 so we all had to stay indoors for two weeks (well, he was quarantined for one week, the kids and myself for two) - no fresh food, no fresh air. Nothing. We didn't even open the mailbox or bring down the trash. Just four people, including a 1 1/2 year old and a 5 year old, locked in a tiny apartment with no proper garden and no balcony!

It was extremely draining!

Don't get me wrong. I love my kids to pieces. They were very sweet and cooperative and the firstborn was old enough to understand what was going on and why certain rules applied. She did an impressive job. Both kids did surprisingly well. In fact shortly before the pandemic I often thought "If only there was a way for me to spend more time with the kids and not have to work so much and still get payed at least enough to get by!" Well, be careful what you whish for!

But for a social introvert not having a single day to herself for months on end is torture.

In addition there were good reasins to worry about the development of the pandemic itself. Would my mother or my in-laws be affected? How much of a hit will the economy take? When will the demand for my services take up again or do I have to look for a new source of income and maybe learn a new profession? What if the age of business travel is over and video conferences will replace physical conferences and meetings with interpreters even after the pandemic? Will schools reopen in time for my SO to be able to get a job after the current contract runs out?


So what did I learn in quarantine/lockdown? Just how much I need alone time and several new ways of keeping the children busy and entertained. Mad Herring is intellectually curious so she learned (mostly self-taught) to read and write a little and do some basic math as well as a little more English during lockdown, things she wouldn't have been taught yet in kidergarden had she been able to attend. So she actually got ahead of the game

 

[Kingu Kurimuzon]

I've not had the time. My company furloughed most of the people in my department, then dumped most of their work on me. I'm thankful to have a job and income, but it's meant a heavier workload. I had to cancel some planned Spring and Summer time off as a result too. In addition to that I've been working from home, and away from the office it takes a little longer to do a lot of my work. Again, thankful I've been able to stay home when others are forced to go back to work, but it's not been easy. When I'm not working I'm just trying to keep up with house chores and yardwork. By the time I do have free time, I'm too exhausted to really put any physical or mental energy into any extracurricular activities, so usually at most I will read or play a video game.

It's a shame because there were several projects I'd been hoping to tackle this summer. I was going to repair and rebuild a few old Schwinn bicycles, finish recording and mixing my album (which is roughly 75% finished but in limbo), read a lot more books, start meditating, etc. Oh well, life could still be worse, I shouldn't complain as I've been luckier than a lot of people during this pandemic