August was a very up and down month. It started on a big up swing with school open houses and the first days of school for Adelaide and Emerson. The kids were measurably excited for school. We gave it a lot of thought and chose not to send either kid in a mask. In Florida – and our county – masks are optional. Given that and having a feel for the general probabilities of kids wearing masks, we chose not to send our kids. Mostly for social reasons. Why make whether a kid is wearing a mask or not a reason to not be friends? Innocent kids don’t need to get involved in the political fights of their parents. Funnily enough, Emerson chose to wear a mask after the first day.
The kids also got to start their new activities – gymnastics, soccer, & art club! Both kids wanted to do gymnastics, Emerson wanted soccer, and Adelaide chose art club at school. It’s a pretty fun set of things for them to do!
Somewhat predictably, Adelaide’s school shut down after the first week. She had a slight runny nose over the weekend and a very slight fever, so we debated sending her to school on Monday. Though there are zero mitigation efforts, symptomatic protocols are pretty strict and harsh. Showing symptoms requires a negative covid test and/or 10 days of quarantine!
Sunday night, we got an e-mail from the school saying they were going to shut down for 10 school days due to a covid outbreak amongst the staff. That bailed us out of our decision on Adelaide – she was perfectly fine by Monday morning, for what it’s worth.
That 10 day shutdown turned into 2 full weeks. We kept Emerson home during that time too – just to be safe. It was kind of nice. A 2nd run at summer – only this time we could enjoy a bit of time in Florida’s warmth. Emerson developed a few symptoms as did Karissa and I – but nothing major. Getting a covid test in Florida in mid-August was nearl impossible. Gov. DeSantis shut down the community testing sites after declaring covid over. But the various school outbreaks forced him to reopen the sites.
I crunched the numbers based on herd immunity, vaccinations, and R0 of delta – and figured that 20% of Floridians could have an active case of covid in a week! Of course, reported numbers didn’t get that high, but based anectodal evidence it seems plausible. We learned that 30% of staff was positive and from Facebook, it seemed that about that percentage of students was positive. Of those that tested. We didn’t test – and could have been positive too! Pretty wild!
Upon resumption of school, the staff are required to wear masks – mask mandates for kids are illegal in Florida because of “freedom” – though we chose to have both kids wear masks going forward. Not enough kids wear them, but hopefully it helps protect our little girl a bit until she can get vaccinated.
We also celebrated my 35th birthday. Hard to believe I’m now in my “mid-30s”! We watched the house continue to make progress. And discovered a great place to spend some time – the “Shell Factory” where they hold weekly flea markets and have a small amusement park, carousel, mini golf, and more! In the midst of all of this, Karissa and I started a raw vegan diet. That means we only eat raw plants. No cooking. It meant a lot of salads and raw fruits. It wasn’t too hard, in some ways…but I haven’t looked at a salad the same since ending it!
August was a very good month. We got school started, a second taste of summer due to covid the outbreak, and continue to get closer to moving in to our new house.