“Why don’t we have things that other people have?”  Naomi’s question came out of the blue, as I was preparing dinner in the kitchen.

“What things do you mean, hun?” I asked, wondering where this question was headed.

“Like a hot tub, or video games,” she informed me.  Ah, ok, this wasn’t going to be that difficult.  I just had to remember that whatever I said would likely be repeated to friends whose families DO have those things.

“Well, we spend our time and money on the things that we value.  Dad and I like doing active stuff more than we like sitting in warm water.  We also value creativity, and we think your creativity will grow more without spending lots of time on video games.  Other families have different values.”  There, hopefully that wasn’t too offensive.  Incredibly, she let the issue drop.

“What are these holes?” Naomi asked, her face inches from the dirt bank as she scrambled around the rock outcrop.  We were walking around the quarry rim….or, more accurately, I was trying coax her around while she was stopping at every excuse.  Well, that question wasn’t so treacherous; no value judgments involved, just bugs.  I love bugs.
“I’m not sure, but maybe bees live in there–some kinds of bees dig holes in banks.”

“Here, let’s see how deep the holes are,” I suggested, deciding to embrace the snail’s pace and curious myself to poke a piece of grass in to the openings. “Wow, look, this hole is at least 10 cm long!” (Delight of the Day:  fishing a grass stem surprisingly deep into a tiny insect hole).  We poked dry grass stems into the holes for a while, orangutan style, before we disturbed one of the insects in residence. An oblong beetle scuttled out, mottled pink and brown.  “We’ll have to look that one up in Milo’s insect book when we get home,” I suggested.  “Uh huh,” she nodded, obligingly.  Try as I might, I’m not having much success instilling a love of insects into my children.

There’s a quote from a distinguished British biologist, JBS Haldane, who found himself in the company of a group of theologians.  Feeling metaphysical, they asked him to reflect on what science had taught him about the mind of God.  Haldane answered “The Creator would appear to have an inordinate fondness for beetles.”  Apparently there are 300,000 species of beetles on earth (just beetles, not insects as a whole), compared to about 9,000 species of bird, and 10,000 species of mammals.  Go beetles!

These ones turned out to be common tiger beetles.  It’s their carnivorous grubs that live in those tunnels, ambushing insects which walk by for more than a year as they grow up.

Bubble life

New Zealand is at an Alert Level 4, which means, among other things, that “businesses are closed except for essential services (supermarkets, pharmacies, clinics and lifeline utilities).”  “Nonessential” businesses must close, unless they can operate completely without people interacting.

The day the government made the level 4 announcement was a confusing whirlwind of businesses trying to position themselves as “essential” so they could keep going during the lock down.  The Warehouse announced they were essential because they supply people with all the leftover containers and toasters and socks that they need for modern life….liquor stores were essential because they sold “food.”  But the government soon put a kabosh on most of those shenanigans.

Zealandia, being involved in food production, could continue with commercial veg transplant production during the lock down, but no pansy seeding, and no philodendron transplanting.  Ornamentals aren’t essential, while food is.  I spent my last day at work making up big containers of surface sterilizer (H2O2), and writing instructions to staff on how we must now operate in order to avoid virus transmission….and pass our MPI inspection.

I walked past my boss’s window to clock out on March 25^th, and he waved me over.  “Stay home tomorrow,” he said.

Bugger.  Zealandia might be essential, but I’m nonessential.

I’ve come to hate that word.

It means that my efforts, my skills, and my intelligence are nonessential.  Not needed….unimportant…..  More ornamental than nutritional.

That’s a deflating realization.

…particularly when Jeremiah’s work, bridge design, is classed as an “Essential Service,” and Monday – Friday 7:30-5:30 he disappears into the bedroom to maintain his career.  This past week that work has involved a surprising number of light-hearted teleconference conversations, trivia quizzes, and remotely conducted social hours replete with beersies.  To be honest, it has also involved hard conversations about pay cuts and (I’m sure) many hours of actual work.  But still, I’m jealous.  Non-essential and jealous.  In comparison, next week I’ll continue to do nonessential tasks around the house….wipe pee off the toilet seat, bake cinnamon rolls, restrict the kids’ screen time, vainly try to make Milo into a kinder person.

It probably niggles because it gets down to the thorny question of “what’s my purpose in life?”  I don’t want to be ornamental.  It’s a big existential question which I haven’t answered for myself, clearly, or I’d be happier cooling my heals at home…..provided whatever purpose I chose can be lived out without actually doing anything…..

When today is certain to be the same as yesterday, there’s no reason to get up early. I’ve been a bit crook and haven’t been sleeping that great, so a sleep-in was welcome. But 9:22? That’s definitely a record for me.  However, my delight of the day didn’t involve sleeping.  

These buttery yellow crocuses stopped in my tracks–they are glorious. Crocuses are one of my favorite flowers, and a glance starts the flash reminiscences…my mom’s Saratoga garden in spring, the patch of early spring crocuses in the grass at the end of the suspension bridge at Cornell, the tangled brilliant yellow strands of saffron in a clear plastic cube.

Crocuses are ridiculously optimistic, starting up in the end of the winter, undaunted by snow, one of the first hopes of spring.  I don’t know why they’re blooming now in Christchurch, when it’s fall, but they make a nice connection between the hemispheres–they’re probably blooming in parks in NYC right now.  I’m not going to draw any inferences about hope and the end of winter and all that poetical nonsense; our crocuses are blooming in autumn after all.

Today I made a pumpkin bread, a recipe from a dear Owego friend (Barb!).  “Bread” is a bit of a euphemism; it’s truly a cake.

It’s not the first time I’ve made it in NZ, but it’s the first time since I’ve had my bundt pan, one of the items we shipped from the states.

There’s something infinitely more satisfying when this bread is baked in a bundt pan. I checked it at about an hour and it was close, but the next time I checked it it had puffed up nice and round, with the oozy middle bit splitting open the already baked crust. Just delightful.

Good thing the day of the week is displayed on my watch, otherwise I wouldn’t know.  “Maybe this is what it’s like to be retired” I wondered as I jogged around the block.  “It doesn’t matter what day it is; tomorrow is going to be the same as today anyway.”

“Snow Day” was the SCWBI DrawThis prompt for February, and as I put the final snowflakes on my picture today I reflected, pessimistically, that the snowflakes could be virus particles and the picture could be titled “Isolation.”

I did, however, listen to an interesting podcast or two today while I was gluing my snowflakes.  NPR’s Planet Money had one titled “The Race to Make Ventilators,” featuring a small company that typically makes 200 ventilators/month, and how the whole game changes when a huge company like a car manufacturer gets their supply chains mobilized.  It seems like a wonderfully American response to a problem.  While we’re hiding in our homes to prevent infection, America is wallowing in infectious crowds, and gearing up to deal with the fall-out by mass producing ventilators.  I’ve also read little news blurps about Johns Hopkins reviving an old medical technique of sharing blood antibodies from recovered patients with the uninfected to temporarily boost their immunity, with the wry commentary that with this disease, there will at least be plenty of people with antibodies.  In America, we fix our problems with ingenuity, technology, and economies of scale!

On a more serious note, it’s like we’re inadvertently part of a huge global trial.  Which country’s strategy will end up better in the end?

I woke up late this morning, but it was still dark out. With the autumn equinox past, we’re moving rapidly into the dark. I can see the kitchen window from my bedroom sliding door, and it was a cozy scene. We started some emerald blue sugar crystals growing yesterday, and the kids were having a sneak peak/lick.

I’ve started doing a little work from home, which would normally be a great thing, but I really haven’t figured out how to do that with the kids sharing the same space.  I can hear my mother’s voice, gently suggesting that the kids have an hour of quiet time in their rooms after lunch.  I’ll try that tomorrow, Mom.  But an hour doesn’t replace a 7 hour work day.

This is the problem with any non-screen activity where the kids are together.  This is how it ends.  Milo does something to accost Naomi, then there’s screeching, tears, injustice and offence, all at high volume.  They seem to have infinite energy for that dance.  On the good side, you notice that there’s blue sky here this afternoon.  After a couple days of rain it’s very welcome.  We sauntered over to the other end of the park and peaked through the gap in the fence at the bare soil beyond, the start of a new subdivision.  “That’s the way to a new dimension,” Milo announced.  I wish.

There was, however, a Delight today.  At 4:30 I told Jeremiah I needed a bike ride and I took off down the Old Tai Tapu Rd.  There was hardly a car in sight, side benefit to the stay-at-home mandate.  It’s a rural road, and with the late afternoon shining on the hedgerows, they perfumed the air, each with their particular bouquet.  Pinus ratiata……horse shit…….cedar………rotten ginko fruits…….fresh cut grass…….musty wet leaves.  Just think what a dog’s nose would experience on the same route.  Then on the way back I passed some familiar figures, screeched to a halt and circled back to have a 2-meter-distant chat with some kayak friends who have just returned to NZ.  They had to cut short their European travels and high tail it back to NZ, borders closing rapidly behind them.  They have been self-isolating for the last nearly 2 weeks, as is required of incoming travelers, and were as glad of a chat with a familiar face as I was.  Welcome home, Chris and Helen.

Another successful day in isolation. Milo, despite the appearance, is actually quite happy. He’s practicing his touch typing….in front of the heat pump, and apparently he didn’t feel the need for clothes.

This pandemic sets in stark contrast the major cultural differences between Kiwis and Americans.  Jeremiah and I have joked that Kiwis are basically socialists, with the largely tax-payer funded medical system, more paid holiday time for all classes of workers, a much simpler tax system, and a more egalitarian society, to name just a few of the more tangible features.  And we have been impressed at how compliant the large majority of our neighbors are with the current stay-at-home rule.

A writer for The Herald, a NZ news source, commented “New Zealand does have a good shot at this [stemming the pandemic] because there is trust in government – unlike in America – and we’re a small, relatively cohesive society, with good social capital that the Government can make use of.”

Trust in Government?!  Right, THAT’s different than in America for sure.

Speaking of trusting the government, a friend living in Canada sent this today.  Jacinda Arden is the current prime minister of NZ, from the Labor party, and even the past prime minister (National party) is quoted speaking supportively of her leadership.  

But what’s this social capital?  

Wikipedia says “Social capital is the effective functioning of social groups through interpersonal relationships, a shared sense of identity, a shared understanding, shared norms, shared values, trust, cooperation, and reciprocity.”

It all sounds very nice, doesn’t it?  A shared sense of identity, shared values….yes, there’s definitely more of that in NZ than in the US. Not perfect by any means, not a utopia or anything close to it, still littered with ugly bits of human nature, but I’m often surprised at how much more shared values and trust there is than what I’d expect, from growing up in America.

We watched “Country Calendar” yesterday, a NZ institution that showcases rural farms weekly, and has since 1966.  All the commercial breaks had a government ad encouraging people to unite against Covid19 by staying at home to, and by doing so protecting the essential services workers that have to be out and about.  And I reckon most people are taking that to heart, at least at this stage.