You know what we do in crises? We normalize. We keep going. We try to keep stable. We cling to routine. We look to gratitude and focus on what we have rather than what we’ve lost. It’s one of the things I love about people and it’s also something that can veer into unhealthy denial. It’s also just exhausting. Moving M into her first non-dorm living situation has required all manner of adjusting and adapting to have this “normal” rite of passage be allowed for her in such an abnormal time. Such a small errand really – take your kid up and spend a few days picking up the minimum needed for a bedroom and a few things for the house at large. But it all takes an additional layer of effort. Make that layers.

Masking for covid while also minimizing any time outdoors for wildfire smoke (and trying to think and plan through an ever present headache from days of “hazardous” air quality). Driving five hours and never seeing a glimpse of blue sky beyond the smoke, and knowing you could have driven ten hours south with the same experience. Seeing the impacts of the disruption of our supply chain when trying to buy fairly routine items. Dealing with very difficult conversations and trade off with a group of friends who decided to live with each other under much much different circumstances last February and are now struggling to find common ground on what “safe” means in these times.

People have lost their homes and people have lost loved ones to these previously unimaginable disasters, so I KNOW how good we have it when I say this, and I say it full of gratitude: this shit is not normal, and this shit is so hard. Pretending it isn’t does nothing for us. I am weary of adapting and normalizing. And I want better for all of us. Now I’m going to take three Advil and go to bed. ❤️ to all who are suffering right now, no matter what that looks like.