Stormy weather

A big storm front rolled through the area late last night. I woke up to the sound of thunder, wind, and heavy rain an hour or two before sunrise. Try as I might, I never really went back to sleep after that. I finally gave up trying, got up, and put on a pot of coffee. The weather matched the mood for the first two hours of the day.

Gregg went to the pet store at 7am (it opens at 10am) to work on the aquariums for a few hours. As long as he doesn't have to have contact with the public, he's glad to get in a few hours' work. I imagine he's also happy to get out of the house for a little while, too, although he's much better at this stay-at-home and play hermit thing than I am. My husband is a true introvert. I'm much closer to the middle of the scale as far as that goes.

I did get to go to the school yesterday for a little while. I was scheduled for a 4 hour shift answering the office phone. It's a comfort to me to go to work right now, no matter that it's only about once a week for a half day. I have a secret gnawing fear that we're not going to be able to open schools back up in August, and at what point does the school receptionist become redundant in a situation like that? At the beginning of the year I signed my work agreement for the next school year, and as a state employee I probably have some protection against losing my job due to the pandemic. Still, I can't help but feel uneasy.

The worst part of this pandemic (to me) has been how uncertain the immediate future has become. Every day I'm dogged with this vague uneasiness and sense of dread that I just can't completely shake. I push it down and try not to think about it too much, but it's there, all the time. I'm still having weird stress dreams, not just at night but during the day when I take naps! That's a first for me. And for the past two days I've been feeling this weight of unexplained sadness. There's no rational reason for me to feel sad, I just do. I woke up that way again this morning.