Staying in and keeping to myself is largely what I do anyways. Not to a ridiculous extreme. I shop.take my kids to the movies, the zoo, etc.

So there are some changes, but these are minor.

Depression and anxiety is and has been a way of life for me for as long as I can remember.

That persistent feeling of dread, that feeling that the worst case scenario is always right around the corner, or that functional mediocrity is the best case scenario, is pretty much woven into the fabric of "me" at this point.

You know how, in Golden Compass, everyone has a Daemon? That's what all this shit is for me. And when it comes to my kids, I already actively fear the worst anyways. Because I went throughout stretches of not eating at all, stretches of living off of nothing but plain rice for several weeks, being homeless, nouncing from place to place...etc... I already have a deep-rooted fear that my kids will wind up having to endure similar things.

These things are already there, some shitnthat just hangs out in the background, and they already fuck with me. There is the added dread of something serious happening and they get this thing. That's new. But it just sort of folds into the rest.

The big change for them is not being in school. Yeah there are virtual classes and whatnot, but not for my son. Auntie does some things with them during the day, and my current challenge is forcing myself tk go home and become a teacher. I'm definitely failing that right now. I'm failing them right now, on that front.

But on the positive end of this, my wife and I are both essential works. I still get, and work, overtime, so we're not facing immediate financial hardships. It is somewhat risky to not quarantine outright, because we're paycheck to paycheck. So perhaps that's something to consider.

So, in it's own, odd, semi-Darwinian way, I'm ideally suited to get through this in ways that others don't seem to be.

How's that for optimism?