Ricochet COVID Symposium: Please Contribute!

 

Over the last week, we’ve heard from Americans just like you. Americans struggling amid the COVID lockdowns. We heard from an “essential worker” who never signed up for what she’s now left to do, we heard from a mother struggling with her six kids suddenly at home for an indefinite amount of time, we heard from an immigrant mother who ran a successful residential cleaning business until this spring.

We’ve heard from so many Americans, but we want to hear from you too!

The coverage surrounding COVID-19 is mostly pundits, politicians, and policy wonks yelling at each other. If you want to end the lockdown, they say you want old people to die. If you want to extend the lockdown, they say you want to destroy the economy. There’s another side to the story; it’s more nuanced and there are so many stories to tell. We want you to tell yours.

We are accepting contributions to our email and from our members (Not a member? Join today!) Any member can submit their story (between 500-1,000 words, ideally) for the member feed, and we will choose a few to go on our website every day. Your entry may be edited for length or clarity.

In addition, we will be hosting a weekly video symposium via Zoom where participants in our written symposium can share their stories. Live participation will be limited to Ricochet members, but the video will be available on our website the following day.

The first episode will take place live on Zoom on Sunday, May 17 at 9 pm EST. All Ricochet members can join the call, ask questions, and provide answers. We plan on this being a weekly show as the world learns how to deal with this pandemic.

We want to feature a couple of outsiders each week, including Ricochet members.

Write to us and tell us: How are Coronavirus and the associated restrictions affecting your job, your industry, your kids, and your physical and mental health?

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  1. Bill Gates Will Inject You Now Inactive
    Bill Gates Will Inject You Now
    @Pseudodionysius

    And what of Canadians?

    • #1
  2. RushBabe49 Thatcher
    RushBabe49
    @RushBabe49

    Last time I looked, my post had 54 “likes” here on the Main Feed.  Thanks everyone!

    • #2
  3. Merrijane Inactive
    Merrijane
    @Merrijane

    I feel like my experience hasn’t been interesting enough to share–what to say about two months stuck at home? I like hearing what others have done, though.

    • #3
  4. M. Brandon Godbey Member
    M. Brandon Godbey
    @Brandon

    Ricochet Editors' Desk:

    Over the last week, we’ve heard from Americans just like you. Americans struggling amid the COVID lockdowns. We heard from an “essential worker” who never signed up for what she’s now left to do, we heard from a mother struggling with her six kids suddenly at home for an indefinite amount of time, we heard from an immigrant mother who ran a successful residential cleaning business until this spring.

    We’ve heard from so many Americans, but we want to hear from you too!

    The coverage surrounding COVID-19 is mostly pundits, politicians, and policy wonks yelling at each other. If you want to end the lockdown, they say you want old people to die. If you want to extend the lockdown, they say you want to destroy the economy. There’s another side to the story; it’s more nuanced and there are so many stories to tell. We want you to tell yours.

    We are accepting contributions to our email and from our members (Not a member? Join today!) Any member can submit their story (between 500-1,000 words, ideally) for the member feed, and we will choose a few to go on our website every day. Your entry may be edited for length or clarity.

    In addition, we will be hosting a weekly video symposium via Zoom where participants in our written symposium can share their stories. Live participation will be limited to Ricochet members, but the video will be available on our website the following day.

    The first episode will take place live on Zoom on Sunday, May 17 at 9 pm EST. All Ricochet members can join the call, ask questions, and provide answers. We plan on this being a weekly show as the world learns how to deal with this pandemic.

    We want to feature a couple of outsiders each week, including Ricochet members.

    Write to us and tell us: How are Coronavirus and the associated restrictions affecting your job, your industry, your kids, and your physical and mental health?

    I’m an HS English teacher that, in 48 hours, went from “you might be going home for a week or so” to “for the rest of the year you’re going to be teaching fifty kids through your home computer.”  It was in interesting experience.  Is that what you guys want to read?  

    • #4
  5. Bill Gates Will Inject You Now Inactive
    Bill Gates Will Inject You Now
    @Pseudodionysius

    Merrijane (View Comment):

    I feel like my experience hasn’t been interesting enough to share–what to say about two months stuck at home? I like hearing what others have done, though.

    If air travel wasn’t so restrictive, I was hoping to overthrow a small Latin American township and establish myself as Spectre division chief in the next woke Bond movie. Alas, t’was not to be.

    • #5
  6. JennaStocker Member
    JennaStocker
    @JennaStocker

    RushBabe49 (View Comment):

    Last time I looked, my post had 54 “likes” here on the Main Feed. Thanks everyone!

    It’s a great post!

    • #6
  7. RushBabe49 Thatcher
    RushBabe49
    @RushBabe49

    JennaStocker (View Comment):

    RushBabe49 (View Comment):

    Last time I looked, my post had 54 “likes” here on the Main Feed. Thanks everyone!

    It’s a great post!

    Thank you!  56 now. 

    • #7
  8. She Member
    She
    @She

    I live in the country.  My nearest neighbors are 1/4 mile away, left and right of me.  I’m only about 40 miles from Pittsburgh, and 8 miles from the WV border, but it’s quite rural and definitely Trump country.  I’m peevish because my gym has been closed since the middle of March and I can’t go for my thrice-weekly swim.  Otherwise, I’ve been going all the places I like/need to go (Giant Eagle (the supermarket), Tractor Supply and Home Depot–I lead such an interesting life) pretty much as I did previously.  I do wear a mask when I’m in crowded situations, or if the venue requires it. I don’t wear one otherwise, and certainly not when I’m on my daily 2 1/2 mile walk with the beavers, the deer, the kingfishers, the heron and the geese.

    I’m very grateful to be retired, and that my stepdaughter, who’s working, has a job that adapts relatively easily to working from home.  I wish they were closer, as I haven’t seen Jenny since early March, and I haven’t seen our granddaughter since Christmas.  My Internet connection (satellite) is quite poor, and Zoom or Skype, or any other video solution I’ve ever tried, doesn’t work well.  The cellular signal ain’t great either.

    But I chug along.  The most exciting event on the farm the last few weeks has been chasing, and hiving, bee swarms.  I have a very helpful neighbor who comes and helps me with that.  I’m getting a lot of home improvements  and gardening done, as I like to do that myself, and thank goodness PA never went the Full Whitmer, although there are some very stupid inconveniences we have to live with, chief among which is the idiotic call in/pick up arrangement if one wants something from the liquor store. 

    Mr. She was 82 last week and suffers from severe dementia as well as a number of heart and lung issues.  It’s been a bit of a slog not being able to take him out to his favorite “senior buffet breakfast” at Eat ‘n Park on Tuesday mornings, and I don’t feel comfortable just taking him out for a drive in the car at the moment because I don’t know if I’ll be able to find facilities if I need to.  He has great medical care from wonderful doctors, but I think it’s been adversely affected for the past three months.  Visits which should have been in person, have been telephonic, as we really can’t do them even via video (see, “lousy Internet connection, above), and I think he’s suffered with some leg issues far longer than he would have, had I just been able to make an appointment and take him in, early last month.  No question that his condition has deteriorated considerably since early March, and he hasn’t seen a physician since January.  Help is on the way, though, as normal programming is starting to resume, and we’ll have our first experience with a visiting nurse next week.

    We don’t socialize much, but I do miss being able to sneak out for a treat or a couple of hours of “me” time, if I want to buy myself lunch, or go to a movie.  And of course, I miss seeing my friends,  a couple of whom are cancer survivors and are being extremely careful, as am I, because I don’t want to bring Covid-19 home.  I’m not scared, and I’m not unreasonable about it though.  I think we need to live our lives, and find a way to coexist with this until we can find a vaccination or a cure.  If we can.  I’m sick of all the politics, all the shouting, and all the virtue-signalling, and I wish there were health-care professionals with actual real-world jobs running this task force, and not a bunch of bureaucrats who haven’t practiced face-to-face medicine with actual patients in decades, if they ever did.  I’d volunteer the staff and administration of my little community hospital where I worked in IT for twenty years for the job if I could.  The hospital has no coronavirus patients at the moment, and they have been waiting around for months for the apocalypse, bringing in very little revenue, having cancelled all elective surgeries as instructed.  The place is largely empty.  There have been, to date, 129 cases and four deaths in Washington County.  With the single exception of a single nursing home in Beaver County, Western PA, even including Allegheny County (Pittsburgh) has been relatively lightly hit.

    I’m really not at all badly off, when I look at, and think about, how others are suffering, if not from the disease, then most definitely from the panicked response to it.  They, and both my countries, are in my prayers.

    • #8
  9. JennaStocker Member
    JennaStocker
    @JennaStocker

    She (View Comment):

    I live in the country. My nearest neighbors are 1/4 mile away, left and right of me. I’m only about 40 miles from Pittsburgh, and 8 miles from the WV border, but it’s quite rural and definitely Trump country. I’m peevish because my gym has been closed since the middle of March and I can’t go for my thrice-weekly swim. Otherwise, I’ve been going all the places I like/need to go (Giant Eagle (the supermarket), Tractor Supply and Home Depot–I lead such an interesting life) pretty much as I did previously. I do wear a mask when I’m in crowded situations, or if the venue requires it. I don’t wear one otherwise, and certainly not when I’m on my daily 2 1/2 mile walk with the beavers, the deer, the kingfishers, the heron and the geese.

    I’m very grateful to be retired, and that my stepdaughter, who’s working, has a job that adapts relatively easily to working from home. I wish they were closer, as I haven’t seen Jenny since early March, and I haven’t seen our granddaughter since Christmas. My Internet connection (satellite) is quite poor, and Zoom or Skype, or any other video solution I’ve ever tried, doesn’t work well. The cellular signal ain’t great either.

    But I chug along. The most exciting event on the farm the last few weeks has been chasing, and hiving, bee swarms. I have a very helpful neighbor who comes and helps me with that. I’m getting a lot of home improvements and gardening done, as I like to do that myself, and thank goodness PA never went the Full Whitmer, although there are some very stupid inconveniences we have to live with, chief among which is the idiotic call in/pick up arrangement if one wants something from the liquor store.

    Mr. She was 82 last week and suffers from severe dementia as well as a number of heart and lung issues. It’s been a bit of a slog not being able to take him out to his favorite “senior buffet breakfast” at Eat ‘n Park on Tuesday mornings, and I don’t feel comfortable just taking him out for a drive in the car at the moment because I don’t know if I’ll be able to find facilities if I need to. He has great medical care from wonderful doctors, but I think it’s been adversely affected for the past three months. Visits which should have been in person, have been telephonic, as we really can’t do them even via video (see, “lousy Internet connection, above), and I think he’s suffered with some leg issues far longer than he would have, had I just been able to make an appointment and take him in, early last month. No question that his condition has deteriorated considerably since early March, and he hasn’t seen a physician since January. Help is on the way, though, as normal programming is starting to resume, and we’ll have our first experience with a visiting nurse next week.

    We don’t socialize much, but I do miss being able to sneak out for a treat or a couple of hours of “me” time, if I want to buy myself lunch, or go to a movie. And of course, I miss seeing my friends, a couple of whom are cancer survivors and are being extremely careful, as am I, because I don’t want to bring Covid-19 home. I’m not scared, and I’m not unreasonable about it though. I think we need to live our lives, and find a way to coexist with this until we can find a vaccination or a cure. If we can. I’m sick of all the politics, all the shouting, and all the virtue-signalling, and I wish there were health-care professionals with actual real-world jobs running this task force, and not a bunch of bureaucrats who haven’t practiced face-to-face medicine with actual patients in decades, if they ever did. I’d volunteer the staff and administration of my little community hospital where I worked in IT for twenty years for the job if I could. The hospital has no coronavirus patients at the moment, and they have been waiting around for months for the apocalypse, bringing in very little revenue, having cancelled all elective surgeries as instructed. The place is largely empty. There have been, to date, 129 cases and four deaths in Washington County. With the single exception of a single nursing home in Beaver County, Western PA, even including Allegheny County (Pittsburgh) has been relatively lightly hit.

    I’m really not at all badly off, when I look at, and think about, how others are suffering, if not from the disease, then most definitely from the panicked response to it. They, and both my countries, are in my prayers.

    Thank you for sharing this. You’re the full time caretaker for your husband, and what seems like a common thread for those is the people for whom they care don’t fully understand why the outside world is ‘shut down’ or the drastic change in their routine. It’s been very hard on my niece, and therefore hard on my brother and sister-in-law. I hope the gradual opening eases your worries, and you can get back to the pool soon!

    • #9
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