The land of the blog posts
The kind of workshop that's actually engaging, useful, and inspiring. It was about how to be a better storyteller and it made me want to start this blog to work on my own storytelling abilities. From the speaking perspective, I think my storytelling skills are not too bad. I think I can mostly tell a good story when I'm talking, but it really made me interested in developing a better writing voice, an area I think needs more work.
It started off a day like any other day. Well, I did snooze my alarm twice and I would say that's not really every day, but nevertheless let us proceed. I currently function as Andrew's alarm clock so I attempted to wake him up after perusing my phone for a few minutes. He grumbled a "no" and went on to tell me he had a fever so he would not be getting up. Obviously I immediately assumed he had COVID-19 and therefore I would be imminently contracting it and that quickly spiraled into concerns about my heart and then additional concerns about my how recalled ICD might just suddenly die on me. If you're looking for a way to quickly wake up your brain, I highly recommend starting with a series of rapidly escalating doomsday thoughts.
I decided to take 2 minutes to stop worrying about myself and went online to do the CDC assessment for him. I also texted my sister who is not a doctor but is my best friend and therefore must immediately know anything of significance in my life. Fortunately, the assessment did not recommend he go get tested so I tried to relax a little. He stayed in bed to keep sleeping and I went for a short walk to get the mail.
After getting back to the house, I decided to do some more worrying. We had dinner with my coworker and her husband this past week so I sent her a text explaining that Andrew had developed a fever and I wanted her to be aware, and would keep her posted. We were also supposed to have dinner with another pair of friends this weekend, so I texted them to let them know that would not be happening unless we knew with 100% certainty he did not have COVID and he was fully recovered. Then I texted one of my best friends who is a PA for her thoughts. Perhaps not surprising her concerns were about me (she is aware of my heart condition) and she wanted to know if he could go get tested. I explained the CDC results and a little bit more about his symptoms, and we agreed he sorta seemed OK but testing remained the good idea hanging out in the background. By this time I had made us breakfast and he ate an enormous bowl of oatmeal so that seemed like a good sign. He went back upstairs to sleep and I went to the office to pretend to do some work. Ok, I did some work but luckily work is pretty light for me right now anyways.
As a fundamentally selfish being, my next line of concern was around whether I should go to my reserved lap swimming slot at my HOA pool tonight. The very normal, high value concern all good humans have. Naturally I could not decide this alone so I discussed it with my sister, my PA friend, and another friend. Unsurprisingly, my PA friend recommended I not go because I would not regret being too cautious. Of course this is the reasonable course of action, so I cancelled the reservation and updated everyone else on my decision (giving credit to my PA friend). Let's be honest though, what I was really doing was asking everyone: but don't you actually think that probably everything is fine and chances of anything being really wrong are so low? I realized everyone was actually telling me that something might be wrong.
I started looking up information about where Andrew could go to get tested. We had lunch and I told him that he should call the Utah hotline to explain his symptoms and that they would likely be able to provide any needed referral for the testing. Andrew sort of agreed but what he actually did was sleep so the hotline did not get called. Fast forward to dinner time and we were trying to figure out what to order (did I mention my HVAC system isn't working and it's 90 degrees out?), and I am again encouraging him to call the hotline. He finally does call and speaks with a medical professional who gives him the number for a nearby clinic to get tested. Andrew tells me he tried to explain that he felt his symptoms were a little different because he really had a sore throat but the guy responded "oh no you're good that's a symptom." I think we might feel differently about "being good" on that one. Andrew is advised that the clinic is closed though, so we make a plan to call tomorrow and see about getting tested. I told Andrew about my work schedule so he can keep that in mind when scheduling an appointment (if he needs to do that), with the full understanding that even in the absence of a fever he is pretty unlikely to remember everything I told him. Tomorrow's problem.
We ate dinner while watching an episode of the Watchmen, which by the way is probably the best show I have ever watched. I do not fully understand everything that is going on but I am fully invested.
As an event in history, I was aware of the Tulsa massacre but I had no real idea of the full extent of the violence. The opening episode showed me just how little I knew. I'm not going to pretend that I am capable of teaching anyone anything beyond what I could Google and parrot back to you, but I would be failing to capture the real story of my day if I didn't at least mention something about the Black Lives Matter movement. Of course I will inevitably say the wrong thing, or not say the right thing, if not in this post, then in another post, but I want to say I think about it every day and I think about what I should be doing to do my part to enact real change. I would describe myself as a very political person. I have always cared a lot about keeping up with the news and knowing what's going on, and I have always researched candidates (not all of them I'm not perfect) and ballot proposals and made sure I am voting. I have not used any of my social media platforms to talk about any of the current events, mostly because I primarily function as a quiet observer of everyone else's content but also because I don't know what the right thing to post is, and I don't know that I would be adding anything of value. I'm just not posting anything at all as a result, which is probably not the worst outcome but I am still grappling with what to do. I have decided to use this blog post as a means to share some thoughts and maybe that will be ok. I will save the next post for a longer discussion on this topic, but in the meantime please feel free to donate to your local Black Lives Matter chapter or the NAACP Legal Defense Fund or some other organization that is doing good work to fight against systemic racism.
After dinner I did some exercising in the backyard to close my rings. I am a fancy person with an Apple Watch and I have been really determined to keep closing my rings because I have gained some weight since moving to Utah and quarantining and I am not loving it so I am trying to be more active. I stayed outside for a while after, largely because I didn't want to come back in to the warm house while still sweating but also because I was kind of trying to avoid Andrew anyways so why not do that outside. Eventually I went inside, took a shower, checked to see if Andrew needed anything, and set up shop in the guest room where I will be sleeping for the night. Then I sat down to write this post and here we are! I'll be honest, I'm a pile of emotions tonight and there’s a nonzero chance I'll just fall asleep faceplanted on the bed. But the real plan is to do some Headspace meditation and get some sleep. Thank you for reading this first attempt at a story, which really turned into quite the endeavor with the length of this thing, or for scrolling all the way to the bottom to see how it ends. I'll take both as a win.