Well, another day into this\nviral-chaos, but better than several of the past. My three grandkids are over\nfor the weekend and life suddenly fell back to a comfortable normalcy; we made\nbrownies, swept the driveway, drove RC trucks, and rode our bikes to the high\nschool. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
My eight-year old just finally learned\nto ride two wheels late in the season last fall (he was still seven at the\ntime). It was struggle for him \u2013 it was mostly fear of failure that held him\nback; he wouldn\u2019t try, said he didn\u2019t care, and played it as no big deal; but\nyou could see in his eyes that it was. I kept pushing and he kept resisting and\nit looked like it would have to wait until the spring. But I read a tip on the\ninternet to help him \u2013 take the pedals off the bike, then start by pushing and\ncoasting and then graduate to coasting down a hill \u2013 feet just sticking out in\nspace the whole time. The idea is to take away any added fear, consternation,\nor frustration that can come with trying to learn to balance and steer and pedal\nall at the same time. And it worked. Within minutes he was coasting downhill in\nthe yard with no training wheels and no pedals, hooting and hollering the whole\ntime. Then I took him to the high school where there is a much longer hill to\ncoast down, and he nailed that so we put the pedals back on the bike and had\nhim coast down with his feet on the pedals without actually pedaling and that\nworked. And before we knew it, he was pedaling the bike like a pro; and proud\nas could be of himself. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Riding the bikes to the high school has always been reserved for the ten-year old and myself. If the younger wanted to go too, we\u2019d either walk the bikes to the high school or load them into the truck and drive over. It is only a couple of hundred yards down the street, and there is a sidewalk all the way, but I would not let them ride until I was confident that they wouldn\u2019t steer off the sidewalk and into the road, so the younger one was aching to be allowed to ride to the school. He asked today if he could ride there and I wouldn\u2019t let him; I wanted to give him a chance to work off the winter cobwebs in an open parking lot first, so we walked the bike there. Once there, he instantly rode like a pro \u2013 not even a hesitation or a stumble. So we rode around and around for over an hour, and once done, he got to ride his bike all the way home on the sidewalk. And he nailed it!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It was so nice to just get outside and\nenjoy the day, and a lot of others had the same thought \u2013 the tennis courts all\nhad people on them, people were walking their dogs or just themselves, and\nother were riding their bikes as we were. Every one was keeping a respectable\ndistance from each other \u2013 social distancing \u2013 but we all obviously delighted\nto be doing little more than enjoying life instead of worrying about their job,\ntheir health, or their toilet paper.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I remain hopeful that the silver lining in this pandemic will turn about to be about healing; not from the virus but from the bitter divisiveness rending this country apart. America remains sharply split, unreasonably so, over political partisan lines, and that is being carried over into the response to this virus. I truly hope, that as we get more deeply immersed into the chaos of this catastrophe, that we can stop trying to blame or accuse and can actually start to help each other get through this. But we are not there yet; misinformation is rampant and mistrust is widespread. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Despite that, I do see numerous buds of compassion and caring everywhere in my community; in fact, I think they are beginning to outnumber the venomous and vitriolic comments and snide remarks in social media. Much like the crocuses, the daffodils, and the forsythia, hope and love are taking bud and preparing to blossom. Share the love dear reader, just please keep your six foot distance and be sure to wash your hand afterwards! <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Well, another day into this viral-chaos, but better than several of the past. My three grandkids are over for the weekend and life suddenly fell back to a comfortable normalcy; we made brownies, swept the driveway, drove RC trucks, and rode our bikes to the high school. My eight-year old just finally learned to ride […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2191,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"ocean_front_end_style_editor":"no","ocean_post_layout":"","ocean_both_sidebars_style":"","ocean_both_sidebars_content_width":0,"ocean_both_sidebars_sidebars_width":0,"ocean_sidebar":"0","ocean_second_sidebar":"0","ocean_disable_margins":"enable","ocean_add_body_class":"","ocean_shortcode_before_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_after_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_before_header":"","ocean_shortcode_after_header":"","ocean_has_shortcode":"","ocean_shortcode_after_title":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_bottom":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_bottom":"","ocean_display_top_bar":"default","ocean_display_header":"default","ocean_header_style":"","ocean_center_header_left_menu":"0","ocean_custom_header_template":"0","ocean_custom_logo":0,"ocean_custom_retina_logo":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_height":0,"ocean_header_custom_menu":"0","ocean_menu_typo_font_family":"0","ocean_menu_typo_font_subset":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_size":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_unit":"px","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_line_height":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_unit":"","ocean_menu_typo_spacing":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_unit":"","ocean_menu_link_color":"","ocean_menu_link_color_hover":"","ocean_menu_link_color_active":"","ocean_menu_link_background":"","ocean_menu_link_hover_background":"","ocean_menu_link_active_background":"","ocean_menu_social_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_links_color":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_color":"","ocean_disable_title":"default","ocean_disable_heading":"default","ocean_post_title":"","ocean_post_subheading":"","ocean_post_title_style":"","ocean_post_title_background_color":"","ocean_post_title_background":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_image_position":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_attachment":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_repeat":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_size":"","ocean_post_title_height":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay":0.5,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay_color":"","ocean_disable_breadcrumbs":"default","ocean_breadcrumbs_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_separator_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_hover_color":"","ocean_display_footer_widgets":"default","ocean_display_footer_bottom":"default","ocean_custom_footer_template":"0","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"ocean_post_oembed":"","ocean_post_self_hosted_media":"","ocean_post_video_embed":"","ocean_link_format":"","ocean_link_format_target":"self","ocean_quote_format":"","ocean_quote_format_link":"post","ocean_gallery_link_images":"off","ocean_gallery_id":[],"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2190","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-life","entry","has-media"],"yoast_head":"\n