Words in a text I receive from Ellie… as the caption to a photo of a lopsided little snowman built on a patio table in a quad at her school. Clearly making the most of the snowy weather this month that makes its way to college campuses as well–suspending things, pulling them from indoor, online lives out to the wild and stilled wonder of winter. Take that, you nasty pandemic. Little hapless fellow, lumpy middle, sloping shoulders, sporting an outback boonie hat and two twigs for arms. Even his pose is one of resignation. NO hugging no gathering no touching no sharing nosingingnolaughingnobreathingnobeing…no….no…no…. Here he is, little snowy smiling yes. Or at least a maybe. Two button eyes and a carrot nose and–Hey! Where’s his mask?! Other shared photos from these snow days show them–campus fun all normal-like. Frosty goes CDC. This little guy looks at me from his centerpiece perch–small, but valiant, and her words whisper the resignation and quiet resolve that blankets this period of time in pandemic life for our students, a plea more than a declaration… It is small, but still good.

For all of last semester Ellie and a roommate knocked about in a four-bedroom on-campus apartment. It was her pick, over a year ago, the finest, funnest arrangement life could deliver, with three of her favorite peeps coming and going to class their junior years, cooking around a kitchen island and gathered on boxy dorm furniture to chat or chill at the end of a busy day. Classes and jobs and coffee dates, pinging all over campus and coming home to their apartment. I remember the day she called to tell me about it, so happy with what was to come. Over the summer the university rethought this perfect plan and decreed that none shall have a double room, no not one, so they went from four people in a two-bedroom to four people in a four-bedroom ($$$), and then–because of the cost and the university’s 100% online class offering–lost the two whose out-of-state status made living on campus for online an untenable outlay. When I brought her to school in September half of her dream apartment was padlocked and off-use for its shrunk tenancy. The reality that she would not see another un-pixilated human (other than her roommate) for the next four months made my move-in heart heavy and my glasses foggy over my mask. So many stayed away, saving money, biding the time, figuring online school could be done just as well from home. Were parents are landlords and the laundry is free. We could have done that. Or we could made a housing stink. I have recently joined the Facebook page for both universities’ parents association and boy, do they. We could have tried to rearrange, found different housing, but Ellie was at the time (a) undergoing an emergency appendectomy and (b) on her way to quarantine camp for the 12 weeks that restored as much “normal” as any camp, program, community or organization I have heard about then or since, and (c) her roommate was out of state busy with her summer. We chose not to change up everything. We remained hopeful. That the university would open at all, that once open it would strive for in-person work arounds and that gradually, gradually the restrictions could loosen and allow students to creep back to whatever housing they would allow, this was our prayer. It was huge and half empty, but still good.

This week her voice sounds tired and far away. There is an echo, I swear, in that apartment and in her life, though it is chock full of “classes.” Never one to step lightly or shy away from anything academic, Ellie is at a full six plus labs. Getting our money’s worth and, under normal circumstance, in her glory. But this spring the classes are asynchronous. No meeting in real time. This means no class period, no professor (other than the one, Oz-like, behind the discussion board or weekly posted “modules” of readings and assignments,) and more importantly, no classmates. Never mind no faces, the Zoom plight, now there is no nothing. Sure, you can email folks all day and night, and read their replies if they do, but there is nothing in real time. Class is never “over” because it never begins, until you turn it on and decide to deal with it. The new Pandora of academe. A playlist of someone else’s selection. That somehow always misses your favorite song.

In some ways, asynchronous is good. You can do the work any time, anywhere, any way you choose, and then (usually) report in, like an agent in the field. You can do two things at once, or more, if you like–or, in the culture of Zoom, you can be the proverbial fly on a wall or fly away entirely, and nobody would really know. Think Will last fall, his bedroom window thrown wide open and his teacher valiantly teaching away to a class of ceiling fans, my freshman out on the driveway where he could still hear it, building a skate park in Biology class. Nobody would miss you because there’s nobody there to notice you are gone. Of course, I emphasize the good. “It’s just like grad school, Ellie!” I crow as we drive back up 95 to drop her off, “It’s perfect! It’s such good training and a test of your time management and motivational skills!’ Independent Study on steroids. All the work and no pesky professor lecturing you every day learning you up with their professional lore and life experience never mind their personality, quirky penchants, and stabs at 90s humor. Or classmates annoying you with their differing views or questions you hadn’t thought of. Really. Much better this way. But it is not perfect. It is lonelier than ever. “What class, mom?” she answers when I ask the question. “There is no class. It’s just me in my little bubble.”

Sophie goes back late, first of February, holding, hoping beyond hope, probably praying, certainly begging for the world to hold. Just let her be there. Just let this thing hold. “You know, mom,” said my wise one to me last fall or rather last summer while we waited with baited breath for UVA’s decision to be or not to be, “if they told me I could come to campus and lock myself in my room and not go anywhere or see anyone, I would just love that. I would. Honestly.” This from our social butterfly? Oh, really?? I tell you what. In this giant failure of education to play its main card in a pandemic, you wait. You wait and see if we aren’t schooling them in the greatest lessons we had all but forgotten to teach: Resilience. Perspective. Patience. Awareness. Empathy. Grace.

In a bold step for humankind, Will went back to school in person this semester. Our local high school, second half of his freshman year. Every day we get an email about positive cases, and individuals identified as close contacts (You: Quarantine! See ya in 14) . He can’t ride the bus, or sit with friends at lunch. There’s no “changing out” at gym (the locker rooms are — go figure–locked), so for PE they just walk the track outside in their street clothes, everybody aware that the rare sunshine and rarer still warm weather is the biggest, simplest, Covid-safe, free-est blessing these days to a variety of ills. There is no marching band, no sports spectators at games, the hallways in his building are taped, the traffic between classes is all but single file, the drinking fountains covered, the bathrooms by appointment only. His first day report: “Mom! Mom, it’s awesome! It’s so normal.” (You know which emoji goes here). Yes, my son. How ’bout that. It is small, but still good.

I am happy for the snowfall because as always, it slows the world down. This world that was at a standstill anyways. But this is such a more likeable reason to stay indoors, and a safe one to come out and play. At least she will see other college kids, from across the quad, maybe realize the little bubble is floating in a bigger world. All of them come away from their studies for this the most childlike of winter pleasures: a day in the snow. I wonder if she even has her winter gear up there. Will she think of the trick of sandwich baggies on her feet inside the shoes or whatever makeshift boots she can find? For Christmas Santa brought them another roommate, completely out of the blue, a senior health science major who’s apparently just passing through and got assigned to the little apartment. LOTS of apprehension and consternation going for that little development, which is kind of funny, if you think about it. Got my own personal irony blizzard going on here when I do (think about it): the world so blown disastrously and irrevocably beyond your planning and control, and you sweatin’ a stranger fixing her cheerios in “your” kitchen for a few months? No surprise, within hours they are a couple conversations into an enduring friendship, have rearranged the kitchen cupboards to make space, identified a couple of this new one’s personal habits and hung a third towel in the little bathroom. The little apartment breathes a happy sigh. It is all. And it is good.