Today was day 10. We ate lunch alone in different rooms. It brought us together.

This week in our home there's been both aggravated and unaggravated tears as well as hysterical laughter. Cascades of chaos and moments of calm. There's been a lot to manage... Taking stock of the food we have, changing shopping methods, finding new ways for the kids to hit their daily exercise quota, navigating what down time and recharging can look like, and trying to support healthy relationships within our family. Not to mention trying my hand at homeschooling, keeping up with the news, processing pains of many, and thinking through what it looks like to be a good 'neighbour' at this time. Perhaps you can relate!

But it's been the working out of the big needs of little people that has been one of the most challenging things this week. The tears, screams, and abrupt outbursts that signal something is surging! And today, on day 10 I feel I started to hear what they're really saying.

​It's all about DISTANCE.​

These kids are used to the flowing tidal dance of together and apart. 

After a morning of activity : chatting over breakfast together, playing together, getting ready for the day together, creatively writing a story together, going on a maths nature walk together, eating morning tea together, it's no wonder there's a fraying around the edges by 11:30.

Today we decided to put our apart zones to good use and do something that clashes with one of our family values: we eat together. Lunch was a time not for relating, but for renewal as we each ate in silence in a separate room having 'Space Time'. Today this decision was reactive, but from here on in I'm hoping make this one of our daily rituals.

Usually time with my kids is so precious that I'd err towards filling it. Not in a suffocating kind of way, but more in a being in the same room as them kind of way. Existing side by side together - jealous to give up eating meals with them. But things have changed. Now I'm more willing to move away from them for a spin on the bike as Dave comes home, or to eat lunch in silence along for the sake of renewing in order to reenter together time well. This crisis has brought us together all the more, but we're still on track to find the healthy balance of time apart.