Home Schooling a 4 Year Old, Running a Business & Climbing Trees
- By Leta Kalfas, President and CEO of MtnStuff, LOWA’s rep agency for the Rockies
We each have stories about how this pandemic is affecting our lives; we are working from home, sheltering in place with our loved ones, using video conferencing for meetings and happy hours, and using screens and social media to simply stay connected, somehow.
Just when we need each other more than ever, we are told to stay apart. A cruel trick!
Our stories intersect and have commonalities, but they are not all the same. For me, I have had a rude awakening to the stress of running a business during this time, but also, homeschooling a 4 year old! I am fortunate to have a wife who is here to help when I have meetings, and a smart older son who is on auto-pilot with his online learning and mostly helpful.
But this 4 year old, Apollo, needs so, so much, and where does that time come from?
My home office is now half preschool room with letters, numbers, white boards, puzzles, games, a calendar for days of the week… you remember, don’t you?? The other half is an attempt at an office, also shared by my wife who is also working from home.
I could go on – but here is what I figured out: we are at a time in our life where there is so much out of our control, and yet, what we do have in our control is right in front of us. How we respond is really at the crux of this, and I have chosen a “slow down and appreciate” approach that I likely would have never taken the time to do.
We are cooking together, eating together, playing games together, throwing the frisbee together, riding bikes together, watching movies together, and yes, climbing trees together. Who remembered that climbing was so much fun?!
Appreciating each other in a more intentional way is the lemonade that I am making out of these lemons we have been given.
It’s a gift, really. And so far, so good. We are in this together, and we will get to the other side together… maybe in a different way than we are used to. But hopefully, a bit more mindful of those we love who are right in front of us.
- Leta Kalfas, President and CEO of MtnStuff, LOWA’s rep agency for the Rockies