By Dr. Peaches Henry

After we finish working from home, are done with homeschooling each day, or have been sheltering in place, what do we do with ourselves and our families?  The SIPO has reminded me that humans are social creatures.  Friends have told me that they miss their colleagues at work.    Students are missing their classmates and teachers.  Families are wondering how they replace Boy Scouts, dance class, soccer, baseball, youth church, performance groups, debate team, History Fair, Science Fair, etc.  Adults no longer have book clubs, yoga class, gym workouts, volunteer groups, social clubs, church meetings, and more. We have gone from days and evenings filled with social activities to social distancing. 

During the SIPO, it is crucial that we remember this:  Social distancing should not mean social isolation.  Everyone should feel she belongs to someone.  It is up to each of us to make sure that we reach out and take care of each other.  I’ve been mulling over how we can take care of each other during this enforced down time and came up with some ideas.  These are not the only (or even the best) ideas.  They are merely my ideas for how to survive the SIPO with peace, patience, camaraderie, and love.

Yourself

You know those airplane safety instructions that tell you to “put your own oxygen mask on before you help others?”  The same rule applies during the SIPO.  Take care of yourself first.  This is the time to pamper yourself.  You will be taking care of others, especially those of us who are in the sandwich generation, so you need to be healthy.  Sandwich generation?  That’s those folks who are simultaneously raising children and caring for parents.  Here we go.

1. Write a blog.  That’s what this is.  According to my son, if you email it, it’s just an email.  For it to be a blog, you have to post it on a site.  That’s why I am posting it via ActLocallyWaco.
2. Now is the time to get social media literate.  Join Facebook and send out friend requests and accept friend requests.  My 67-year-old aunt sent me a friend request last week.  I accepted with alacrity.  Twitter is a great place to put in your two-cents worth on all manner of issues, and now you have the time to do it.  Also, learn video conferencing platforms like Zoom.  Even if we can’t touch each other, we need to see each other.  Make-up isn’t necessary, but you might consider combing your hair before joining a meeting.
3. When you go on a grocery run, grab a bunch of flowers to brighten up your house.  You’re going to be there a while.
4. Do your own mani-pedi.  As much as I would like it to be so, a mani-pedi is not an essential function. For the foreseeable future, we are not heading to the salon or the barbershop.  If you are really brave, cut your own hair or have your partner do it.  Or you can let your hair grow uncut for as long as the SIPO lasts (men can let their beards grow too like superstitious baseball players do).  Come on; it’s a pandemic.  We’re already living dangerously.
5. Take a bubble bath.  First, put the dog out and tell your children (and partner) they can only bother you if doing so involves fire or bleeding that won’t stop.  For bleeding, tell them to try a tourniquet before knocking on the bathroom door (remember to lock it).
6. Organize your old photos (paper ones not virtual ones).  If you don’t have actual photos, download the FreePrints app and print photos from your phone.  They will arrive in your mailbox within a week.
7. Stream a television series from your childhood.  Mission Impossible is still an incredible show—much more intelligent, intriguing, and suspenseful than the Tom Cruise film versions.  Gunsmoke, Law and Order, and The Simpsons tie for the longest running television series (20 years).  That’s a lot of binging time.
8. Check in with friends and family to let them know how you are doing.  Call a friend and have a long talk.  Call an empty-nester (though the SIPO may have reversed his status).
9. Make a summer playlist, because summer will come.  For that matter, make a Christmas playlist.  I made a Motown playlist.  It was like choosing between your children—Marvin Gaye or Smokey Robinson.
10. Take advantage of the library’s pandemic curbside service.  I consider it an absolute luxury to order the books I want and then drive by the library to have them delivered to me curbside.  Add some chocolate cake, and I’m in heaven!
11. Read a book and then watch the film adaptation of it.  If you enjoy historical fiction, Hilary Mantel’s trilogy about Thomas Cromwell is a nice long read.  In the words of an NPR reporter, the volumes are doorstops.  For a scholar of nineteenth-century literature, that’s a compliment.  PBS’s Masterpiece Theater has adapted the first and second books, Wolf Hall and Bring up the Bodies, into a series.  The third novel, The Mirror and the Light, is newly released.  I snagged a copy from the library before the SIPO (Thank you, NPR!); I’m rationing it to myself (you would be surprised how quickly 754 pages can go).  The best mystery I have read is Anatomy of a Murder by Robert Traver who based the novel on a 1952 murder case in which he was the defense attorney.  The book was a lucky find in a dusty Manhattan bookshop where the owner was surly, the books dusty and arranged in no particular order, and no one bothered you for hours.  The 1959 film version was directed by Otto Preminger and stars Jimmy Stewart.  Fun fact:  The actor who played the judge in the film, Joseph Nye Welch, was actually the lawyer who famously confronted Joseph McCarthy during one of the senator’s communist activities subcommittee meetings, “Have you no sense of decency, sir? At long last, have you left no sense of decency?”  Another fun fact:  Duke Ellington composed the music for the film. Play with your pets, preferably a puppy.  They have an infinite capacity for joy.  It will rub off on you.
12. Pack your emergency go-bag for a different type of disaster and place it near an exit.  A friend convinced me to pack mine.  It’s a surprisingly reassuring task to accomplish.
13. Take the Census.  For each person (baby, child, teenager, young adult, adult, senior) who goes uncounted, McLennan County will lose thousands of dollars per person per year for the next 10 years!  The Census supports: voting access, income security, medicare/Medicaid, SNAP (food stamps), & Headstart.  Go to 2020census.gov.  The deadline to take it has been extended.

Your Family

The SIPO has you sequestered at home with your family.  Now that you are homeschooling your children, you have new-found respect for teachers, right?  One friend of mine had to video her son practicing his music homework and then post it via an app.  She said that figuring out how to post that assignment nearly drove her to drink.  Even children who had flown the nest are back at home living in their childhood bedrooms.  And let’s not talk about what it’s like for both you and your partner to be working from home.  At the end of the day, all family members could just retreat to their corners and huddle with their phones.  However, we can use this moment to connect meaningfully with our families, deepen our relationships with our partners, redefine our relationships with our college-aged children (they are adults now), learn together, and just have a good time.

1. Have at least one meal a day with the whole family.  Play the phone game during dinner (rules below).  While you are playing the phone game, talk to each other.  Set a topic for discussion.  Start with something interesting and fun:  What music are you listening to these days?  Rules:  All phones go in a basket in the center of the table within everybody’s reach.  Each person gets 5 dimes, nickels, or quarters (you decide what you want the stakes to be).  Throughout the meal, each time a person reaches for his phone, he must toss a coin in the basket.  Whoever has the most coins left at the end of dinner wins. This is a light-hearted way to keep the family away from phones during meals. 
2. Put a jigsaw puzzle together as a family.  Remember those?  Don’t have any at home?  Drug Emporium has some delightful animal puzzles.  The Dollar Stores have a variety of puzzles.  Dash in and out quickly.
3. Play a boardgame.  Now you have enough time to play a never-ending Monopoly game.  Zathura forces players to collaborate to win—great for squabbling siblings.  You only have to know your colors and numbers to play Uno.
4. Use Zoom to get together with your family.  There are other video conferencing platforms; use the one that works for you.  My family had a Zoom birthday party for my nephew who was turning 30.  My son and I made cookies for him and mailed them to him.  The whole family attended a Zoom meeting to wish him well and watch him open his cards and presents.  He loved it and we were all “there” on his milestone birthday.
5. Call extended family members to check on them.  Your great-aunt would love to hear from you.
6. Have each family member write a letter to herself to be opened on New Year’s Day 2021.  Setting a later date will be hard for young ones to conceive.  Seal them and put them in a special canister.  Craft idea:  Decorate a shoe box or oatmeal canister to use to place the letters in.  There; I’ve included crafts.  Personal note:  crafts make me anxious.  Since this is the twenty-first century, each family member could create a video addressed to himself and save it to the Cloud for later viewing.
7. Have each family member make a top-ten favorite movies list (one each for best sports film, drama, mystery, buddy cop movie, western, animal movie, animated/children’s movie, horror flick, science-fiction film, comedy).  Share the list with each other; a great conversation will ensue.
8. Create a family book club.  As a family, read a book and then watch the film of the book.  Then discuss both.  The Call of the Wild comes to mind—short enough for everyone to get through, exciting enough to hold everyone’s attention, and easily understood by all.  This is a great book to read to young ones who can’t read yet.  You can get a free full-text copy of The Call of the Wild and other books at www.Gutenberg.org.
9. Teach your teenager to caramelize onions.  Learning to do so will teach him patience and provide him with a skill to impress a date when he’s in his twenties.
10. Organize your recipe box.  Identify family recipes and write an explanation about who gave you the recipe, when it is made, and why it’s a favorite.  In my family, I make bacon and cheese quick bread only for Christmas morning breakfast and dressing quiche the day after Thanksgiving.  Use the family recipes to plan a week of meals.  Get each family member to help prep the meals.  Chopping vegetables in the correct portions can teach fractions.  Why is a fourth of a cup smaller than a third of a cup?
11. Make and send greeting cards for people who have lost loved ones.  People are dying from COVID-19 and other ailments.  All are unable to funeralize their loved ones with cherished rituals.  A note from someone acknowledging their loss can help ease their grief.

Your Community

We miss our friends, church members, work colleagues, yoga class, team members, club members, our children’s teachers, the daycare staff, the lady at the gas station, the department secretary, the custodians, and so many others.  Again, social distancing should not mean social isolation.  We can reach out to our community to let them know we are thinking of them.  We can also perform real acts of support for each other.

1. Write an old-fashioned letter to friends, relatives, seniors and isolated individuals.  At first, they will be puzzled (what is this thing in my mailbox that’s not a bill?); then they will be delighted.  Don’t want to write a letter; send a postcard.  Not into snail mail.  Pay twenty bucks and send a digital JacquieDawson.com card.
2. Make homemade greeting cards.  Use anything to make them—magazines, coloring book pages, canned good wrappings, pretty recipe cards.  Mail them to church members on the shut-in list, a local nursing home, or assisted living facility.
3. Check on your neighbors.  If you are young, let elderly neighbors know that you will pick up items from the grocery or pharmacy for them.  Have a chat outside your house.  I chatted with a widow down the street from me; she stood in her yard, I stood on the street. 
4. Take a walk in your neighborhood.  You will meet neighbors you never knew you had—at six feet apart.  Everyone will be out walking to alleviate cabin fever, and everyone will greet you with gusto and a smile.  They will be happy to see someone besides their family members.
5. Write a thank-you note to essential workers (a grocery store stocker, clerk, pharmacist, nurse, doctor, respiratory therapist, prison guard).  Put them in a large envelop and mail them to a local hospital (identify them on the outside as thank-you notes).  Give one to the cashier when you check out at Walmart, HEB, or Aldi’s.
6. Food pantries across the county are seeing much greater numbers of people needing help.  The next time you make a grocery run, pick up extra groceries and drop them off at a food pantry or center for the homeless.  Frequented needed items:  canned meat, canned fruit, bottled water, condiments, pasta, peanut butter, toilet paper, and toiletries (I collect miniature toiletries from hotels to donate.). 
7. Much needed items at homeless shelters, domestic abuse centers, pantries, and charities are feminine hygiene products.  Many girls get feminine hygiene products from school nurses; with schools closed, there is a real need.  Compounding the problem is the fact that women and girls are embarrassed to ask for these products. 
8. Since we are sheltering in place, it might be easier to make a monetary donation.  There are numerous places in Waco that you can donate to online:  Shepherd’s Heart, Carver Park Pantry, Caritas, the Salvation Army, Paulanne’s Pantry and many others. 
9. Did I say TAKE THE CENSUS?  For each person (baby, child, teenager, young adult, adult, senior) who goes uncounted, McLennan County will lose thousands of dollars per person per year for the next 10 years!  The Census supports: voting access, income security, medicare/Medicaid, SNAP (food stamps), & Headstart.  Go to 2020census.gov.  The deadline to take it has been extended.

Each day of the coronavirus pandemic confirms what poet John Donne wrote nearly 400 years ago: “No man is an island entire of itself / every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main.”  Let us remember Donne’s words and embrace this opportunity to care for one another.

Peaches Henry is an English professor at McLennan Community College.  She is currently teaching online and sheltering in place with her eight-month old black Labrador puppy and her son who has returned home from law school.

By Jennifer Salazar, Program Director of the Texas Senior Medicare Patrol, The Better Business Bureau Education Foundation

Scammers use public health emergencies as opportunities for new fraud schemes. In fact, The Federal Trade Commission has already received complaints about stimulus checks scams.

As you may know, the government is preparing to distribute stimulus checks to help provide relief to households due to the COVID 19 crises. Things you need to know:

• Individuals with adjusted gross incomes of less than $75,000 should expect to receive $1200 with couples receiving $2400, and $500 per child.
• The rate is adjusted if the gross income is more than $75,000. This will be based on your 2019 tax return, or 2018 if you haven’t filed yet for 2019. Please keep in mind that it is estimated to take weeks for these checks to be distributed.
• Your stimulus check will be directly deposited into your bank account if funds you received from your 2018 tax return were directly deposited. Otherwise your paper check will arrive by mail.
• Social security beneficiaries will automatically receive a stimulus check via direct deposit. There is no need to complete any tax information. The IRS will automatically use what the Social Security Administration has on file.

Scammers are already using this opportunity to steal the money coming your way or your identity by getting access to your personal information. Keep in mind; no one has early access to these funds! Beware of the following scams:

• Fake Stimulus Checks. There are fake checks circulating right now. It will take at least three weeks for direct deposits to land and up to 10 weeks for paper checks to arrive by mail. If you receive any checks now, it is a fraud. Telltale signs are checks written in odd amounts or include cents, or a check that requires you to verify receipt online or by calling a number.
• Social media, phone calls, or text messages claiming to get in touch with you. Scammers are reaching out to people online on social media platforms or by sending text messages with claims they are from the IRS or other government agency and are trying to get in touch with you regarding your stimulus check. Ignore/Delete these messages. The U.S. Government will never reach out to you via any social media platform or by text.
• Scammers pose as a government agency and will send a link to this website or something similar for you to verify personal information. The government does not do this. The government already has the information they need and will not reach out to you for verification of your social security number or other personal identification.
• Processing Fee. Scammers pose as the IRS or other government agency claiming you can receive your stimulus check faster if you pay a processing fee. There is no such thing and there is no way to speed up the IRS payment process.

The IRS will never call or email you to verify any personal information. This includes your social security number, bank account number, or anything that allows access to your identity.

As soon as you receive a call or email saying they are from the IRS or U.S. Treasury, hang up or delete it. These scammers are professional criminals and will use a variety of methods to steal your personal identification and your money.

Texas Senior Medicare Patrol (SMP) is ready to provide you with the information you need to PROTECT yourself from Medicare fraud, errors, and abuse; DETECT potential fraud, errors, and abuse; and REPORT your concerns.

Your SMP can help with your questions, concerns, or complaints about potential fraud and abuse issues. It also can provide information and educational presentations.

Texas Senior Medicare Patrol 1-888-341-6187

Individualized support for people affected by pandemic available 7 days a week at The Salvation Army.

WACO, TX (3/31/20) — As the days and weeks of stress and strain weigh heavily on the nation, The Salvation Army has established a place anyone affected by COVID-19 can call for emotional and spiritual support. The Emotional and Spiritual Care (ESC) Hotline is available from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. (CST), seven days a week at (844) 458-HOPE (844-458-4673). A team of ESC specialists, made up of Salvation Army Officers and trained employees, are avilabable to help callers, in both  English and Spanish  

The specific goal of the hotline is to offer assistance to people overcome with worry or undue stress caused by the pandemic. Callers will find people ready to listen to their concerns and pray with them.

“Our goal is to give people an opportunity to connect with someone who will hear their story and concerns. We hope to offer a calming presence in the midst of circumstances none of us has ever experienced before,” said Major James Taylor. “The Salvation Army wants people to know they are not alone and that even though we might not be able to meet them face to face, we care, want to listen and are as close as a phone call.”

The hotline, which started taking calls Friday, March 27,  received a number of calls its first weekend including a mother dealing with the additional stress of two weeks of home schooling her children for the first time, another individual seeking advice and prayer while facing the potential loss of their home, and a young man coping with the reality of being furloughed from his job. All callers expressed their gratitude for the opportuntiy to speak with someone and receive prayer. If needed, callers will be referred to additional helpful resources when possible.

Immediate physical needs in the community such as providing meals through our Community Kitchen, groceries through the food pantry, shelters for the homeless, hygiene supplies, and emergency assistance will continue to be addressed by The Salvation Army during this crisis. Facilities remain open, while our Thrift Store was required to close.   

Emotional and spiritual care is an integral part of year-round Salvation Army service. Particularly evident during times of natural disaster, The Salvation Army ‘s Emergency Disaster Services teams are known for being the first on the scene to provide food and hydration for first responders, front-line workers and survivors. In addition to meeting those physical needs, the Army also focuses on the emotional and spiritual well-being of those impacted in all sorts of catastrophic events. Though this pandemic is a new situation for the world, the service provided by The Salvation Army to help those affected has decades of experience behind it. Trained ESC staff and volunteers work alongside mobile feeding units as they minister to hurting communities. “Ministry of Presence” training is available to staff and volunteers as part of The Salvation Army’s ongoing training program.

“The Salvation Army is here to help during this time of heightened need, said Major Taylor. “We understand physical needs are just one aspect of this. We also want people to know we are here – trained and ready – to pray with and encourage them throughout this crisis.”

To contribute to The Salvation Army’s ongoing efforts in your community, please visit give.salvationarmytexas.org, call 1-800-SAL-ARMY or mail a check to 4721 W.Waco Drive, Waco, TX, 76710. Donations of supplies are also needed, including bottled water for take-out meals, groceries, cleaning items, etc. please contact our local office at 254-756-7271 for details.