For our family, my husband Isaac Vanderburg, our children Margo and Thomas, and myself – there’s gratitude and grief.

The sweetness of now is so sweet and the anxiety about the future is a rock-hard hammer some days. We know it’s a privilege to work from home, take care of our own kids, have groceries delivered, mask up, talk to our neighbors in the street while we do our best to keep our community healthy. Isaac’s worked from home since early March within earshot of every squabble and fit and shriek of joy and bouncing ball.

And I work when everyone’s asleep but exhaustion comes quickly these days. It took a few weeks to create a new family rhythm without the predictability and company of school and work life. The children were disoriented – a short fuse of angry, angsty, bored, leery, and clingy. We thought the antidote was tightening the ship with color-coded schedules and school projects and clear expectations. But it’s really more tenderness in our togetherness and tuning in.

We try to look into our eyes more, sing and dance, listen fully, read together, check-in, hold each other, and recharge with “cozy quiet time.” If we all get through this liking each other, then we’ve won.

-Kelly DuFort

My #CovidDiariesAK begins with thoughts from Nate in Wasilla:
I have been working from home since the 18th of March. I am extremely fortunate that the company I work for has allowed and enabled me to work from home. My wife is a freelance graphic designer and a stay-at-home mother. For her, the change hasn’t been a major difference. However, the inability to take a three-year-old out and about can snowball the restlessness quite rapidly. It has been hard to explain this to our son and my wife has done an amazing job in engaging him in creative and rewarding activities. Cristina has been practicing a Montessori method with Otto and I think, in these times, it has really paid off. We are anxious to get the social aspects of our lives back, but we also recognize how lucky we are to have our opportunities and abilities to sustain during this challenging time.

-Nate