For parents, this pandemic has been like an immersive video game we cannot win. Every time we manage to master a level—Remote schooling! Explaining germ theory to our young children! Sending kids to school in masks! Sending kids to school in different masks because suddenly those masks weren’t good enough any more!—the ante has been upped.
On March 4th, Superintendent Speno, following the guidance of the VDH and the VT AOE, announced that masks would be made optional at schools as of March 14th. At the time, we were still in the “very high cases” zone and barely past the Omicron wave. With the usual March rash of stomach bugs and colds rampant in the local schools, I thought, why now?
Don’t get me wrong; I don’t love sending my twin daughters to first grade in masks. I recognize that this entire pandemic has been incredibly hard not just on the kids but on teachers, staff, school nurses, and the administrative organization of the school district. It has also, obviously, been utterly challenging for working parents like me and my husband.
Apparently other parents felt the same way as I did when we heard that announcement, and in a response to the “overwhelming number of emails from parents,” the school board put a pause on Speno’s decision. At 3pm on Friday — the last school day before the masks were supposed to become optional — they said, “Never mind! Masks stay on! He was kidding about that!”
We had spent all week talking to our daughters about the change in masking, as had the teachers and staff of all our sweet little schools. As nervous as I had felt about taking masks off, this was getting ridiculous. “Is anyone actually in charge here?” I wondered. Which is why I decided to attend the ensuing public forum last night. Frankly, I just want to know what the hell was going on.
On my way into the local high school, which is where the forum convened, a protester attempted to hand me a NO MASKS sign to wave around in the auditorium. “No thanks,” I deferred. “I am just here gathering information.”
“It’s good to have an opinion!” he informed me, cheerily. Thanks, dude I have never met, for the briefest mansplain ever.
The forum was…. intense. It turns out that my friend who said she would meet me there actually meant “on Zoom,” which is where most of the other parents were. The auditorium was mainly packed with pissed-off high schoolers and aggravated school staff. At the front of the room, the school board and the superintendent were clearly at odds. The forum kicked off with a petulant and terse statement by Speno, followed by some attempts to ask questions by school board members that got drowned out by the surly crowd.
As the night progressed, I felt more and more like I was in a twisted version of Footloose, where all the good people of the town were rising up against the dance-haters. Except in this case, the dance-haters were the mask proponents, while the young, cool, fun people said “No more of your stupid rules! We just want to live!”
Late that night, another official email, in bold, which I can summarize as: “Okay fine, masks off! You can dance!”
I dropped my kids at school this morning with a lot of trepidation. Frankly, I wasn’t even sure what I was going to do once we got there. But as we drove into the circle, I saw other kids not wearing masks, beaming. I saw moms who looked relieved, even ecstatic. I’m pretty sure I saw one mom skipping.
I saw some kids still wearing masks, and other kids looping arms with them to walk into school. I saw the school administrator standing at the door, smiling warmly. Have I ever actually seen her face? I know she had never seen my daughters’ faces, even though they’ve been going to this school all year. They were thrilled to walk into school with no masks on. I teared up when the admin held the door for them, smiling, and said “Let me see your faces!”
I don’t know what is going to happen now, but like a lot of parents, I am ready to opt out of the relentless simulated video game we’ve all been living in. I don’t know what “normal” is anymore, and I certainly don’t know the answers to the great “mask or not to mask” question, but I can’t wait for a little bit of humanity back.
I went straight from school into town and bought a few buckets for the stomach bug we are inevitably about to get. Local parents, Brown & Roberts is stocked up!
