Thoughts, 4/15

Quick thoughts:

• This morning we got a large food delivery and it felt like Christmas. After the debacle on Monday where I ordered 43 items literally from downstairs and we received only one of them, I frantically jumped back on Mercato and attempted to place an order with the place that delivered next-day last week. The earliest available date was today, and fortunately we got almost everything we ordered, with very reasonable replacements. It took an hour to clean everything and put it away, and the kids’ excitement was matched by our own. This might be the most excited I’ve ever been about food. Let me tell you, fresh produce is a beautiful thing.
• I had a lovely morning with the kids, such as I feel I haven’t had in some time. Remember when I said in the beginning that every other day was really good? Well, it’s been a while since that was the case, and now I think it was likely because of the food situation. This grants us a reprieve, for a little while at least. We’re filling up the extra pantry we just bought in the meantime; I fully expect things to get worse.
• Highlights from this morning included Ollie going in the potty for the second time since this whole thing started — yay!! — and Sebastian continuing to be a wizard with his Legos. I can’t believe he’s still only four. He’s as much into them as I ever was, and although he’s still mostly following instructions rather than free-building, he’s getting faster and more accurate every day, and more able to improvise his way out of missing pieces. I’m so proud of him. (It honestly feels much more educational than his school sessions, which mostly consist of waiting, staggered, awkward interactions, and teachers failing with the technology. In fact, I let him skip school today to build Legos, and I don’t feel badly about it in the slightest.)
• Also, Ollie’s coming out of his terrible twos, at least for today. He’s being incredibly sweet and cuddly, and showing a very rapid cognitive advancement that mercifully allows for fewer power struggles and tantrums. And he loves to dance. Yes, it’s the best.
• Related to this, I read a piece on Medium entitled The Parents Are Not All Right, which is kind of seminal. It describes just how badly our work-at-all-costs society is failing at achieving anything remotely resembling balance during this precarious…