A New Family Dynamic
One month ago, my family of four was supposed to be heading to Emerald City Comicon. It was one of the few events in Seattle that was still hanging on to a thread of hope that the COVID-19 pandemic measures wouldn’t affect our region.
We bought tickets for our tween and teenage sons for Christmas, and we had been looking forward to nerding out on Star Wars, Stranger Things, and all the underground comic-related booths and upcoming artists we could care to explore.
As Seattle watched wide-eyed as Italy and China shuttered their big events and social gatherings, we weren’t surprised when we got the cancellation notice. Because we had already taken time off of work and school, we decided we would still sneak in a little getaway. We headed to the coast, the last wave of tourists before the cities would close their beaches.
We ordered takeout and touched elevator buttons with our elbows, and as we sat eating waffles one morning in our beach house getaway, we got the announcement the kids wouldn’t be going back to school for 6 weeks. What was a nervous joke on our drive to the coast, was now a reality. I noticed a glimmer of fear in my youngest’s eyes. But we made the best of it, cautiously and lovingly. We flew kites on the quiet beaches, and made peace with the school decision.
Shortly after we got home, the disruptions piled on. My work office was closing indefinitely to the public, and my husband got the news he would need to start transitioning his staff to remote setups and protocol. The first two weeks felt like an extended spring break for the kids, playing video games to their hearts’ content, and not worrying about math assignments. At night, my husband and I whispered about the possibility of job losses, and worried about our parents and the world at large.
I started to notice a change in my kids’ demeanor and behavior not long after the novelty of an extended spring break wore off. They begin to show more interest in things other than video games, my youngest took up skateboarding, and my oldest modified old Nerf guns to suit his vision of Mandalorian cosplay (perfect for 2021 Comicon, if we’re all so lucky).
But it wasn’t just about them finding their own interests without the incessant, mandated curriculum, the scheduled music lessons, and the birthday parties every weekend. I noticed them noticing us differently.
They were now privy to a lot of the behaviors and sides of our personalities that they weren’t previously exposed to. They overheard daily Zoom and Skype calls with our colleagues and began to understand more about our jobs and responsibilities. They saw their father—new to his supervisory role—help navigate difficult situations with his remote staff, from the emotional toll to technical difficulties. At the end of one particularly long day, my oldest, seeing the stress on his dad’s face, offered him a giant hug, acknowledging that Dad must’ve had a hard day.
They witnessed as I hosted a virtual happy hour, pouring too many glasses of wine for myself, resulting in a hangover the next day. As a mom who never wants to feel like I’m condoning drinking—especially over-drinking—my kids had never seen me tie one on. For the first time in my 14 ½ years of parenting, I admitted to the children that I had a hangover the next day. It was actually quite liberating to not feel like I had to hide it from them. I am in fact human, and not the 100-percent supermom I try to be.
I began to soften as a parent. It was OK for my kids to see me in all my states: vulnerable, hungover, uncertain, stir-crazy, irritable, creative, loving, inconsistent, flawed. And in return, I believe I noticed more compassion in them. They were more patient and began to practice more self-control. A new level of maturity was unfolding rapidly in all of us.
It’s only been a month, and we have, at the time of this writing, about another month of “Stay home, Stay Healthy” to go. School as we know it has been cancelled for the remainder of the school year, and a new education paradigm is happening as our teachers and district officials roll out a modified online learning curriculum.
The COVID Kids of 2020 are going to be a unique breed. They will have witnessed a society fall apart and come together, they will likely know someone who becomes ill, or loses their job or home, as a result of the coronavirus. They will see that school, work, and other designs of modern society are fragile, and amendable, and open for reform.
And they will see their parents, and their siblings, and their neighbors, be scared, and resilient, and messy, and kind. They are witnessing an awakening of new family and societal dynamics, and the sunsetting of mindsets that no longer suit us.
And it’s all starting at home.
Writer: Nikki McCoy
Nikki McCoy is a freelance writer whose work has appeared in ParentMap Magazine, the Weekly Volcano, Destinations Magazine, and others. When she’s not writing, she’s thinking about that time she met David Sedaris and he told her to keep writing.