A Fit of Insanity
Understanding my family’s decision to quarantine in an RV
July 2020 in California
Before the wildfires; after the start of widespread protests against police brutality. Before Los Angeles was putting dead covid victims in freezer trucks; after NYC had been through that phase. Before this monolith of a school year had begun; after the entire class of 2020 had been robbed of their proms, graduations and celebrations.
July 2020 in our house
Our family in isolation had watched 126 episodes of a cheesy Mexican sitcom, “Silvana Sin Lana” (an effort to improve our conversational Spanish), done over 100 sessions of “Yoga with Adriene” on YouTube, practiced and performed an intergenerational Tik Tok dance; Darla (16 years-old) had baked about 20 new desserts from scratch; I had ridden over 800 miles on my (NOT A PELOTON) stationary bicycle; and our son, Zane’s (15 years-old) spine was becoming permanently fused to the corner couch cushions from playing video games 13 hours a day.
Some of my creative thoughts and ideas were starting to feel more desperate than helpful. I was fantasizing about changing out my entire wardrobe, and I don’t even care about clothes! We expanded our pod to include more of the kids’ friends. Or maybe that was decision fatigue eating away our will to live, so we gave in and let them see more friends.
On top of cabin fever, please add lack of income
Jeff and I have been very squarely unemployed since the coronavirus began.
Jeff is a studio musician (woodwinds) who spends days in a room full of people blowing particles into the air in the name of art. His evenings are spent in a literal pit with no windows, playing scores for live musical theater productions. I am a professional organizer who goes into peoples’ homes to help them clear their clutter and save their sanity. My job involves a lot of close contact and discussion. Neither job is covid-friendly.
In early July we took a trip up to Mammoth with another family in our quarantine pod. The trip was an eye-opening breath of fresh air which we really wanted to extend for much longer. But we couldn’t justify more frivolity when none of us were earning any money.
The change of scenery worked to improve our moods for the week, until we returned home to the crush of pandemic boredom. It felt even worse having escaped for a beat. As Jeff is fond of saying,
“Re-entry is a bitch!”
Further evidence: my journal entries (of note, I’m not usually much of a crier)
July 14 Isolation brain.
California is tightening back up its restrictions. Everything has to be done outside again. That news + getting home from our super fun Mammoth trip = crying. I cried myself almost to sleep last night. Darla gets emotional everytime we return home from somewhere. Her thoughts are a lot like mine:
- I’m sad.
- I have no friends.
- Well not really. But I don’t feel like hanging out with my friends.
- There is nothing to do.
- I’m confused.
- This super sucks.
July 15 Today we lost our shit so bad that Jeff and I were actually yelling at each other. I can’t remember ever doing that before. If we have, it’s been many years. Yelling felt so uncomfortable and foreign that I started laughing. Jeff did not. So we kept fighting.
July 16 I saw a post from Katie Couric which said, “We are all dealing with a lot. Find a silly song and take a dance break.”
I put on some old Taylor Swift (from when she wrote fun music) to dance in the shower. Got in the shower and immediately plopped down on the tiles, sobbing uncontrollably. So… That was the worst dance break ever, Katie!
July 17 Today I clicked on a video of a nurse in scrubs getting sprayed with teargas as she ran to help a downed protestor.
I cried and then uninstalled Twitter from my phone. I can’t Twitter any more rn. I will read the paper, but live sounds and videos are too much.
I uninstalled facebook a month ago.
July 20 After his coffee-fueled walk, Jeff came in and told me of his new idea. Buy an RV and go see America. Put our house up for rent on AirBnB.
Huh.
Now my mind is working on the plans and details.
I guess we’ll do it.
Zane is NOT on board.
We did it anyway
When we asked our son his thoughts on taking an extended trip in a motorhome, Zane said,
“We are annoying the crap out of each other stuck in this house. Why would you think it’s a good idea for us to move into a smaller one?”
As right as he was about this interpersonal dynamic, he didn’t know of the engine trouble, the snowstorm (!!), or the unanticipated stress of sleeping in a public parking lot we would encounter on the road.
No doubt, the trip provided a lifetime’s-worth of material for our children to tell their therapists. It was also an incredibly brilliant decision for reasons we could never have anticipated. I wrote about it all along the way in newsletters (including amazing photos) which I will post, in their entirety here on Medium, Mondays and Thursdays.
To access my on-going newsletter in real time, please subscribe to “Notes from Nonni”. My family may not be living in a 340 square foot lightning-rod-of-a-home anymore, but we are delightfully entertaining nonetheless.
