May 1, 2020

Well my faithful readers, I should begin by apologizing for the lack of material to read over the past two months and considering everything that has been going on in the world, one cannot blame my lack of creation on a lack of ideas. Navigating one’s way through a global pandemic provides an abundant number of threads of ideas just waiting for the right moment to unravel them and spin them into a coherent tale.   So as we launch into a new month, I’ve decided that today is the day that I begin to unravel some of those threads and post a blog a day for the month of May.

I’ve typed, back spaced and retyped this sentence three times now, as I check my calendar to ensure validity.  Are we really about to enter week 8 of COVID-19 restrictions in Ontario?  March 12 at 4:00 pm, when the announcement was shared that schools would be closed for the two weeks following March break, seems like a life time ago. I’m not sure that any of us could have anticipated what was about to happen, nor where we’d be today and what life would look like. Our day to day reality has certainly become unraveled.  I recall spending too many minutes during March Break checking a Coronavirus Update website and worrying as the Canadian number of cases started to slowly climb from single digits to double digits and then to numbers in the hundreds by the end of the break.  Today, that same website is reflecting over 53,000 cases and over 3,000 deaths, with no indication that the curve has yet to peak.  Like so many of you, the reality of knowing someone, either directly or indirectly, who has been infected or who has succumbed to COVID-19 is no longer just a lead story on the news, it is being woven into my narrative.

As many decided to thread their needles and sew protective masks, our day to day interactions have significantly changed. We are no longer able to visit parents, extended family and in my case our newly married daughter and her husband.  Weekly trips to the grocery store are no longer a quick pop in, grab and run or something tagged on to a busy day. They have become one of the few “events” within a week of being quarantined at home.  Social distancing, restricted number of customers, designated traffic patterns, limits on quantities and limited availability of products are all a part of our new reality.  There is a common thread to how we are spending our days ~ for most of us, we’re working from home, trying our best to stay positive and using innovative ways to connect with others.

Throughout the next month, I’ll do my best to unravel the threads of this new reality, as they connect to leadership, learning or life.

I would love to hear how you are navigating your new reality.  Are you unraveling threads, weaving a new way of doing things or quilting pieces of the old and the new together to create something special?

Come write with me….