Make good use of the time. Here are some smart ideas about what to do if you’re stuck in the house.
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Being quarantined at home to beat a spreading virus is an opportunity to do wonderful, life-affirming tasks, Watchdog columnist Dave Lieber says. In this 2009 photo, Ashley Cooley played with her son Quincy at home.(Kye Lee)
Let’s be blunt. We’re supposed to stay isolated, if we can, so we don’t die. Gets you thinking, doesn’t it?
No, not about how much toilet paper you’ve socked away. It gets you thinking about what’s truly important.
For me, it’s love. Love of life. Love of family. Love of work and play. Love that I get to write this letter to you, and you’re reading it.
I already know what the character Emily learns in the play Our Town. She’s dead in a cemetery when she realizes this:
“Live people don’t understand, do they?” she asks. “They’re sort of shut up in little boxes. … I never realized before how troubled and how in the dark live people are.”
In my favorite lines in all of American literature, she adds, “Oh earth, you’re too wonderful for anyone to realize. Do any human beings ever realize life while they live it? Every, every minute?”
“The saints and poets, maybe,” she’s told.
How can we celebrate life as we stay home these next days to put an end to this virus outbreak? I started making a list of things I’d like to do around the house. I came up with a few ideas and the list kept growing.
Then I asked readers of my weekly “Watchdog Nation” newsletter if they had any ideas. The goal is to offer smart tips about smart tasks that you’d usually not get to do. No time.
Now there’s time.
By Dave Lieber
12:22 PM on Mar 13, 2020