The Coronacation Diaries, Episode 57

Just One More Day

Often, when I'm out running, I convince myself to just do one more mile with the mindset that I can survive anything for just another 15 minutes. 15 minutes is just a flash in the course of a lifetime, and a lifetime is just a speck in the millennia of life on this planet. One more mile is nothing. It is completely doable.

The same goes for grading papers. I can do anything for another 30 minutes. If I just keep grading, I will eventually get them done. 30 more minutes is nothing. Completely doable.

In this quarantine, I find myself gutting it out. Just one more day. One day at a time, like one mile at a time, like one horrible, most likely plagiarized paper at a time, is doable.

The weather report says that we have one more day of crappy weather. Then it will finally warm up again, and the sun comes back out. Just one more day. That's gotta be doable.

After dinner, chaos ensued. There was a squirt gun fight in the living room. There were shrieks and laughter. And then suddenly tempers flared. People snapped. People apologized. There's really nowhere for any of us to go. Everyone stomped off to their bedrooms. I'm alone, sitting in the living room, listening to the squeal of the dishwasher and staring at the pile of laundry. Just another 30 minutes, and I can get the laundry folded and sorted. Just another 30 minutes. That's doable.

The sun finally broke through today, at 7:30 at night. It's 45 degrees outside. We're tired of being stuck indoors. Tempers are short. We're tired of being stuck. It feels like we're at the tipping point.

Just one more day.

And then another.