Wishing you the best of the holidays from the Snipes family! — Camille, Corey, Susan, and Amelie

My 50th birthday is coming up in November 2021, so I’m already in my 50th year of life. I’ve been thinking about how to celebrate this milestone for a while now. Pre-COVID we were planning a trip to the UK to explore some family roots and the English countryside. That’ll happen eventually, but not this year. I started 2021 without any real concrete goals or plans for this milestone. By late February, two had emerged as top contenders, achievable (with effort) and generally positive for my well-being. They are: Shed 50 pounds by Thanksgiving Run in 50K of organized trail and road races by December 31st Starting March 1st, I…

Monday April 20 (Day 36): More 3D printing and processing orders for ear savers, at the expense of normal daily work. Tuesday April 21 (Day 37): Again, ear savers and some normal daily work. After the kids are in bed I process and bag ear savers while watching Tiger King and eating snacks. This is 100% OK. Wednesday April 22 (Day 38): Normal work stuff and 3D printing, which is settling into a normal routine. Susan’s birthday is tomorrow. The kids and I decorated their room because they are having a slumber party with mom tonight. Thursday April 23 (Day 39): Susan’s birthday. I cooked tri-tip steak with roasted potatoes.…

Thursday April 16 (Day 32): I’m not feeling the journaling this week. What was strange and scary is the new normal. We have routines, and they mostly work. The biggest challenges arise from failing to meet expectations, and setting realistic ones. My mother joined Susan’s family call this week, and it was lovely to have her as part of the group. The Tokar family reunion in Toledo, an important and long-running gathering for my wife’s family, is canceled this year. Many people report more time for connection with people by phone, mail, and video conference. We’re still connecting and building relationships, just mostly not in person. Friday April 17 (Day…

Monday April 6 (Day 22): Unlike last week, I had a strong desire to make sure the kids completed their assigned schoolwork today, and it resulted in a lot of tension between Amelie and I. She feels the workload is too high, and the days are too structured and she is clearly very frustrated. That impacts her desire to do the assignments that seem hard or uninteresting. So I end up giving her “well, if you don’t do X then you can’t have Y” consequences, which makes things worse instead of motivating her. I think it is also difficult because Camille has less or easier schoolwork assigned, and seems to…

Monday March 30 (Day 15): First day of “for real” school for the kids. Week 1 was a warmup, Week 2 was spring break (officially), this is Week 3 in which We Try To Get Real Work Done. It was also Susan’s first day back at work after ~1 week of mostly not working. She is stressed. There’s a whiteboard schedule in the dining room that Susan updates every morning. Thanks to this, we have a clear and agreed schedule for everybody, and we know who is on duty for helping the kids at various times. It’s a good system and it feels fair. Amelie lobbied for more unstructured free…

Monday March 23 (Day 8): Back on the work/school schedule today. Susan is taking vacation from work this week and doing more activities with the kids – mainly art projects. I felt better about work and being more productive, but still easily distracted by the news. I see lots of political outrage right now as the white house and supporters are starting to change their tune again, from focus on the epidemic to a focus on restoring the economy. Tonight the Ohio stay-at-home order takes effect, but it doesn’t change anything for us. We were already operating that way. Susan and I are both grateful we are weathering this storm…

This is a brief daily journal of thoughts during the time of COVID-19, from Cleveland Ohio. As of the latest update, neither I nor my family have the virus. Monday March 16 (Day 1): First day of kids home from school. All food and supplies good, spirits good. Susan went to the office but came back after 2 hours because she was there alone and getting paranoid about someone coughing in the hall. Kids are playing together and reworking the song “The Cat Came Back” to include more fart references.  Amelie’s laptop arrived today.  Generally peaceful day with some work accomplished.  Molly feels we shouldn’t visit Toledo as planned; to…