Zooming the Pandemic Episode 5 – “Family”

Zooming the Pandemic writer Deni Loubert continues to look at the pandemic. This time she explores how it is affecting families in New Westminster. From walking the parks and observing the families that have begun to gather to talking with local friends, the episode asks the question “How are families coping with the pandemic in New Westminster”?

With the closure of day camps and many parents working from home – staycations planned and local parks beginning to fill up with kids out of school for the summer, the pressure is on to find creative solutions for bored children and over-extended parents.

The first interview is with Kathleen Summerville, a local parent who had moved to New Westminster’s Sapperton neighborhood over a decade ago to take advantage of the home-schooling program the school districts offered. With her son now living and going to school on the Atlantic coast, she talks about the trials and tribulations of her teenage daughter having to readjust to learning from home again after 8 years of home schooling.

The interview explores the differences between the DL or Distance Learning program used by home schoolers in New Westminster and the current struggles schools are going through to create a temporary home-schooling program during Covid. They talk about the adjustments of any 15-year-old to being cut off from her peers, the advantages of having been home schooled in the past and the challenges of parenting with one parent struggling with the new experience of working from home instead of taking transit into his Vancouver office each day.

Finally, they discuss their hopes and dreams for what we will gain out of this pandemic. What new ideas and ways of living do we hope will “stick” after the pandemic is over and what will we have learned from it? 

As she looks at the locals taking advantage of the warmer weather in local parks, Loubert wonders if we are ready for summer and all the challenges it will bring? The second interview is with graphic designer Johanna Bartel, who lives in downtown New Westminster in a condo with her husband and five-year-old son Marco. 

Johanna talks about her early fears in the first month of the pandemic. She also discusses how her daily routine of working on designs in local coffee shops while Marco was at school has been upset by the pandemic. Instead of their afternoons together playing games and visiting locals – she has learned to find ways to entertain at home. 

But with her husband working from home instead of commuting to work, she admits that it can be hard to find her own space and time in their small downtown condo. While her husband may be good at focusing on his work as a web designer while at home, she finds it a challenge to juggle her clients, her son and her home. 

But in the midst of this she finds faith and hope in the acknowledgement that while we are all struggling, we have gone through far worse situations then this. 

The episode concludes with another walk in the local parks, observing families growing in numbers as Canada Day approaches. With the return of warm sunny weather, will we be able to make the most of what we have and accept what we have now? Can we be kind to each other as we work to all stay safe?