I have been thinking a lot about work-life balance probably in response to all the good and challenging aspects of family life that seem to have converged this past year. More and more I want to be in many places at once, including work and Rochester and Hamilton and London. There was a time when I was very actively involved in advocating for work-life balance: better and more accessible child care, flexible work hours, meetings at times other than the start and end of the school day, job sharing. As I've listened to the challenges that Gena and Derek have faced trying to establish a routine that works for their two jobs, provides Ruby with nurturing care and still leaves time for family life and, of course, Daisy, I've been reminded how hard it is to find that balance and how easily it can be disturbed.

I surprised myself recently when my response to the announcement by the chief executive of Yahoo, Marissa Mayer, that everyone had to stop working from home and return to the office to keep their jobs didn't rise up immediately from my work-life balance roots. I can't believe I didn't see this as an outrage and a step backwards except that I have begun to see "family friendly" and the meaning of work in a different light.

At school there is currently a very strong cultural message from the top that we are a family friendly school. I believe this is a good thing. In a recent email explaining why I would be off campus for several hours yet again for Greg's doctor appointment, the response was, "I hope you know family comes first. Do whatever you need to do." This response, that I know is representative of the culture and not just a response to my particular need, made me feel completely secure to begin the day. Why then, have I been feeling that something about "work" is missing?

A family first culture creates an infrastructure based on the unique demands of individuals and their families; it puts the community need in the hands of those individuals who are present or focused on work at any particular moment.  I am not promoting a "company first" attitude, but I am questioning how you participate in a work community when the individuals you need to do the work are not easily accessible or available to one another. As family has become the valued priority, other things have changed. We have fewer meetings of key work groups, less time is dedicated to strategic or long-term planning, fewer conversations are about process, problem-solving and decision-making, and many fewer voices are heard within and on behalf of the community. Collaboration has become a goal not an expectation and showing up is still valued, but being fully present is not.

In the days when we thought working from home would help us to solve the need for child care or flexible work hours would allow us to sandwich work into the time frame demanded by family life, the balance placed extraordinary pressure on the individual family unit. The balancing act was keeping many balls in the air including the ball for work; often, the expectations of work productivity, participation and attendance didn't shift enough to relieve the stress of holding all those balls at once. The individual paid the ultimate price and the power in the workplace was held by the people who could show up at the right time and in the right place. 

Pandemic Day 25

I am sitting at my desk looking out at all the forsythia in bloom. The daffodils are also in bloom and there are so many all around the garden and the school. Yesterday, the governor announced new requirements for the public. Stay home except for emergencies; people over 70 stay home. Get outside for exercise keeping a 6-foot social separation; people over 70 walk alone. 100% of the nonessential workforce is now required to be home. While the President spins out of control in his ability to address the needs of the country he continues to spin new discussions that create distractions from the reality of a failing health system, deteriorating economy and the need for federal legislation to respond to the requests of local government. He has declared with certainty the availability of drugs to attack the virus, blamed Europe for acting too slowly, blamed China for starting the pandemic, offered help to Iran and North Korea, and taken pleasure in a negative result of his own test for COVID-19. His smile of self-satisfaction on camera is enough reason not to watch his press conferences. These have become his own propaganda platforms.

I am almost at a place in my packing where I am no longer really living in my house. I've taken down pictures, started packing dishes, thinking about the last things to go in the dumpster, and now the challenge of figuring out how to recycle so many unwanted, but perhaps still useful things. In another place and at another time I might just put it all on the curb and hope someone will take it. Perhaps that opportunity is down the road.

Pandemic Day 24

March 21, 2020

Today is the 24th day since the first case of coronavirus was diagnosed in NYC. It was a man in New Rochelle and soon after New Rochelle was put into a one-mile radius zone restriction. Today the governor says that it helped and the spread in Westchester has slowed down. New York City has been the epicenter of the virus in NY State, but the data is difficult to use as a measure of spread since it is tied to the amount of testing going on in any area. NYC has been given many more testing sites than other parts of the state and so the numbers keep increasing. Today there are over 4000 cases in the state. The death rate has stayed around 1%, lower than it was in China and Italy.

The City is on a shelter-in-place order; only essential businesses are open and only those workers and first responders are allowed to go to work. The health care profession is suffering from an overwhelming need and inadequate supplies and hospital beds to care for everyone needing care. Students on spring break have been the hardest group to harness; they continue to show up at beaches to play and slowly the beaches are all closing. Unemployment is up to 20%.

I have been thinking about the privilege of being safe and having my needs met during a crisis like this. Even of having the luxury of taking my car to anywhere I need to go to leave the City if necessary. Here's the start of my list following the model of Peggy McIntosh's white privilege list.

1. I can stay in my house in isolation from others and have a library of books to read, music and my violin and piano.
2. I can stay in my house in isolation and access the internet and all it's power to connect and inform me.
3. I can walk to the grocery store or deli to get food.
4. I can order food for take out with a credit card and not have to meet the delivery person to pay them.
5. I can get in my car and drive alone to anywhere I choose. I do not need to use public transportation.
6. I can go out in my garden and have an outdoor space for leisure and nourishment and peace.
7. Even if there were other people in my house there are many rooms and it would not be difficult for each person to find a private space.
8. I have relatives who are doctors that I could call if I needed a medical opinion.
9. I do not need to go to work to ensure I have money to pay bills or have my needs met during this crisis.
10. I can afford fresh food and have access to fresh food and I know how to cook.

The center of the storm - the center of the COVID-19 pandemic

The "storm" has been gaining strength in NYC since the first case was diagnosed on Feb. 27, 2020, close by in New Rochelle. The coronavirus had already spread rapidly through Wuhan, where it was first identified, and other parts of China and Italy. In the weeks since Feb. 27th the cases in New York State have risen to 1500 people with more than 800 in NYC. We are advised to stay home, stay six feet from people when with them, avoid physical contact and stay in small groups or no groups at all. Children have been identified as carriers who do not usually show symptoms and so the most at risk group (over 60 with health issues and over 70) is discouraged from being around the youngest group.

There are drive-through testing tents being set up in major cities. A positive move to identify as many cases as possible, but one more way that inequity rears its ugly head. To drive through you need a car, you need gas to get to Long Island and you need to drive or have someone drive you while putting them at risk of contracting the virus. This is how the first case spread quickly to the cases outside the man's family and quickly turned into 85 cases during the first week after diagnosis. Hospitals are nervous that at its peak there won't be enough beds, but those who can't make it to a drive-through will risk not getting tested or end up in the emergency rooms as well. We knew our health system was broken, but the evidence is so clear now that it is being tested to its limits.

Schools and colleges are closed, movies, museum and theaters are also closed and restaurants and bars are limited to take out and delivery. The economy is struggling to stay out of a recession and many people are unemployed from the jobs that kept them afloat day to day. Many businesses are also at risk. The bars have missed out on St. Patrick's Day, one of their biggest days of the year. The parade has been cancelled and the Kentucky Derby delayed. Professional sports has called off the rest of their seasons and the Final Four has been canceled.

I feel like we are in the center of a storm and will need to wait until the coast is clear to step back out into daily life and see what the real damage is. Let's hope that as we try to piece life back together that we gain a new perspective, new priorities and a clearer vision for positive change.

50 years of activism

April 18, 2019 will mark the 50th anniversary of the taking over of the Straight at Cornell. It was the end of my sophomore year and finals were cancelled. I understood so little about the unresolved issues and demands of the African American protesters.

On April 23, there was a takeover of Day Hall.

Dale Corson was named president soon after the Straight takeover. His obituary gives one perspective on the event.

Summer and fall 1969

April 5, 2019, Auckland

It's Friday in Auckland and already this week we've had two birthdays, two cakes and two celebrations. Tomorrow is Andrew's brother's birthday and Sunday the family will get together to celebrate all the April birthdays. It's sunny and warm and what started out as a walk to the store this morning turned into a long, leisurely walk through Cornwall Park and a hike up to the peak to see how the trees are doing. When I was here in June 2016, Andrew and I went up to the watch the tree planting ceremony. It's described here in the Auckland Council report.

"A tree will once again stand on the tihi (summit) of Maungakiekie/One Tree Hill following a decision by the Tūpuna Maunga o Tāmaki Makaurau Authority at their hui on Monday 19 October 2015. Planting will take place in winter 2016, during Matariki (Māori New Year) celebrations, where the previous iconic tree stood...Initially, a small grove of three young tōtara and six young pohutukawa, along with a shelter-band of native shrubs, will be planted to ensure the optimum chance of survival in the exposed conditions on the tihi. 

Over the course of several years, and overseen by arborists, a process of selection will see the stronger trees emerge. The aim is that after a decade there will be a single pohutukawa or tōtara.

All of the young specimens that will be planted in the new grove have been grown from parent trees at Maungakiekie/One Tree Hill. Some of the pohutukawa specimens have been sourced from seedlings that were found growing on the former Monterey pine tree that stood on the tihi. The pohutukawa seedlings were saved when the pine tree was removed and were cultivated in nurseries."

On the left, is the photo taken in 2016. You can barely see the fence to the right of the Obelisk and behind the shrubs. On the right, the trees in the center are now rising above the height of the fence.

The animals were all out in the park today and before I finished my circle around the park, the cattle had been moved from one field to another. The information cottage had a new display giving information on the trees, birds and ecology of the park. There were people everywhere in the park, many running the distance up to the obelisk and many pushing baby carriages. I made it my mission today to only take photos in which I could appear and with the bright sunshine I was able to let my shadow stand in for me. It was hard to resist photos I might have taken of the breathtaking views from the park, but I stuck with the exercise and the results are below.

 

December musings

December 19, started...December 22, completed

December and the holiday season, already half over. There is an anxiety I associate with the end of each calendar year; a feeling that there is no turning back and that the past is moving farther away. It's this last idea that sits heavily especially as memory starts to pale and what you remember loses the nuance of the experience.

I am sitting in a Starbucks at the corner of 73rd and Broadway looking out at a row of trees that have been wrapped in bright white LED lights; so white the color is almost silver. As late afternoon sets in, the trees are brightening. It's the week before the winter break for most NYC independent schools and the last few days left for Christmas shopping. Lots of shopping going on.

It's the sixth Christmas since Gregory died and still he is in every holiday step I take. Buy, don't buy... spend the money, don't spend the money...turn on the Christmas playlist...put out the creche...make sure there's enough wine... These things swim around in my head as I move through the season. It feels so different with no one to confer with, no one debating the exact gift for the girls. A long way from our traditional midnight run to Toys R Us when we used to check out the hottest items and get angry over the separation of boys' and girls' toys. That shopping trip always led to arguments over whether children would be happier receiving toys or clothes or other more enduring playthings; signature dolls, wooden toys. It wasn't always that Gregory loved the little bake ovens and doll houses and all the things the girls would see on TV and exclaim, "I want that!" There was the year when Gena was the only child and he and Christopher bought a wooden rocking horse in the City and Gregory carried it home on the hour-and-a-half subway ride to Queens. Or the time he insisted that Kathryn needed a horse of her own and Splash, a neighing, rocking spring horse, took up residence with us. But those efforts quickly got embedded in family schedules and collective enthusiasm for advertising and we were swept up in the mad dash for Cabbage Patch Dolls and Lullaby Ernie and Chatbot. Gregory was the grumpiest in anticipation of the holidays, but the happiest on Christmas morning if the girls were playing with something new and exciting amidst piles of ripped off wrapping paper, the one unique wrapping we saved for Santa to use.

It is the third Christmas since Mom died and I feel her energy all through the season. I have images of her at the piano playing Christmas Carols and memories of her choir at Legacy. She made community wherever she went; something I am still learning to do and am not sure I will ever do in the ways that she could. Her socks have become more dear and keep me warm all winter. I finished the sock yarn blanket from all of her half-used skeins of sock yarn thinking I'd give it away; soon it will be a gently used gift.

We are gathering in Rochester this year for Christmas. Georgia and her family will be here and we'll see Ellen's and John's families at Kathryn and Pat's open house today.  Emma is in New Zealand and we will miss her family though knowing they are in the throes of summer helps to ease the absence. Some year we will all be there enjoying the sun and beach. Some of us will eat Christmas lunch at FBH with Dad. He seems to have lost energy for showing up, but is always interested in knowing where we all are. I hope Ruby gets some fun toys so that we can all play with them on Christmas morning, but I'm certain they won't come from PoPo.