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Coronavirus

Act Like a Lion Even When You’re a Lamb

I know you can’t tell, but I am freaking the hell out over here.

You see, my freak outs are different than most. I tend to hold them deep inside where ordinary people can’t see them.

We keep getting bad news every day, and freaking out is bound to happen in a situation like this.

The best news I’ve gotten is that there is only a small chance that my babies are in danger of the virus. However, other dangers lurk—running out of food or toilet paper. I still don’t get the deal with the toilet paper. PEOPLE, please stop buying it all up. Just clean with your left hand like the old days, man.

And rice, who’d a thunk it? I asked my wife, for the third time, to bring home Basmati rice. Look, in an emergency, you need Basmati rice. Especially if you are vegan or vegetarian.

I didn’t know that rice was going to be flying off the shelves. It wasn’t that I was freaking out about the rice, it was that I couldn’t believe that rice would be the go-to during a national emergency. I had been preparing for this for weeks. I thought to myself, beans but definitely not rice. I was bummed out that I would have to eat my Indian food on Jasmine rice. I am not an animal!

Now, the thing that’s really freaking me out—the red circle maps denoting the areas infected with Coronavirus shown on the news. Those red circles look like target sites— like someone is going to drop a bomb on my city.

A Newfound Respect for Teachers

There are too many things to worry about.

Will my wife get the Rona, and worse, what if I get the Rona? My family can’t function without my leadership. I am being selfless here. My wife is important to the family, of course, but let’s be honest, she is not me. Who else is going to worry about food, school, parenting techniques (punishments), finances, and overall family health?

And when I say worry about them, I mean freaking the hell out. I got school logins I don’t know how to get into. I have a kid I literally give the right answers to, and she still picks the wrong answer three times in a row.

Me:  McKayla, the answer is 4.
McKayla:  this one, Daddy?
Me: that’s three…the answer is 4
McKayla:  Oh, this one?
Me: That’s two. My finger is on the 4; Please pick that one before I lose my mind.

I honestly don’t know how these teachers do it. I’ll tell you one thing though, the next time a teacher upsets me, I’ll be cutting my two-page e-mail down to one page. I have a newfound respect, and I’ll be a little more gracious when handling situations.

How I Keep it Together—Lions and Lambs and Liquors, Oh My

Meanwhile, the economy is crashing, and people are dying.

Still silently freaking the hell out!

Thank you, god, that I was wise enough to collect a year’s worth of alcohol. A year’s worth should suffice; this shouldn’t last that long, right? I don’t know how I would make it through all of this if I had to hide from every human I know for the next year.

I have more than just alcohol to help me through this, though. I have children around me that help mold me into a better man. I know if I’m going bat crazy, then it’ll only freak them out. If I’m freaking out, then my wife will freak out, and she is already freaking out. I’m doing the best I can to keep her calm.

Which leads me to:

Sometimes you have to act like a lion to be the lamb you really are.

I wish I could take credit for that line, but I learned it from Dave Chappelle, who learned it from his mother.

He won the 2019 Mark Twain Prize. In his speech, he was dropping some serious knowledge, but that line seemed to resonate with me. It’s because let’s face it, I am more of a lamb than a lion. For Dave, the line meant that even though he was a meek child, he might have to put on a tough exterior to make it in the world, i.e., to dodge bullying and such. For me, I’ll have to present myself as though things aren’t bothering me, so I don’t alert my family. I want to exude calmness to them. In fact, I’ve succeeded because I’m so tranquil that my wife looks at me and asks, do you even care?

I look back at her nonchalantly and say, “Yep.”

Of course, my wife says she wants me to share my feelings and tell her what I’m thinking. I have personally never found that to be true. I somehow end up in an argument about my feelings because, apparently, she knows how I feel better than I do. And usually, it starts out that I didn’t really want to talk in the first place.

So, I just know that when she knows that I am truly freaking out, she will start freaking out too, and then the children will start freaking out. The global pandemic is enough, but then here comes the avalanche of emotional screaming that I don’t want inside my home.

So, I will keep my answer to “Yep”…Thank you very much.

I get it; we’re all scared. We’re all a couple of moments away from running out of the emergency exits during our essential shopping or stealing an old man’s walker to use as a weapon. I’m not saying that we might not have to do that, but, for the sake of my family, I choose to remain as calm as I possibly can. I don’t want to give off any false alarms. Let’s all continue to be the lion, on the outside, but the lamb we really are inside—finding the calm in the storm.

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