Thursday was day 82 of the pandacademic year and Facilitator Lauren opened the meeting with a review of practices and then opened it up for people to share announcements. Then each of us shared what we would like our first act to be as soon as the pandemic ends: drive to parents house, hug them, and cuddle with them; get ice cream with friends; go play at the park with my friends; go to Main Event and try to hang out with friends; say “oh, cool” and then go back to doing what I usually do; visit my aunt in Pennsylvania; go back to what I was doing; get in the car and take a really long road trip to the east coast to see friends and family; “same as [what other Learner said]”; go to Abrome and ride my e-bike; go to a pool with a high dive and a slide; gonna spend the day with my partner because we haven’t had more than two hours together like every four months. The answers tended to fall along age and technology lines. It seemed that older Learners and Facilitators wanted to go be with people they haven’t been able to see much during the pandemic, younger Learners wanted to go play with friends, and those in between tended to want to just go to places where other people were. And the ones who would just go back to doing what they were doing tend to spend a good amount of time interacting with others via their computers.

After the morning meeting I had a one-to-one check-in on Discord with the Learner who would like to go to a pool with a high dive and a slide. We talked about how the Abrome meetings were treating her, and about coming back together again in-person, hopefully soon. Then when we finished I jumped back on Zoom for the daily 7-minute workout with the usual crew. We all appreciated the movement early in the day and gave each other high fives before going our separate ways.

Next up was Facilitator Ariel’s coffee and read offering, which has not had a great turnout as of late. Nonetheless, we both enjoyed drinking caffeinated drinks, reading our books, and discussing our books at the end of the offering. Following coffee and read, Facilitator Lauren had two one-to-one check-ins with adolescent Learners, and the Learner from the second check-in then immediately joined me for another check-in.

In my one-to-one check-in we talked about the Jurassic Park movie series, and I told him I had no clue there were that many Jurassic Park movies. Then we talked about other movies series to include Star Wars and Jaws. I told him I tended to prefer stand alone movies, and had a hard time naming a series I particularly liked. I said, Cars, I guess. Looking back on it I probably would have added Bridget Jones. He was pretty disappointed, but not as much as I was when he said he hates Asian food. I said Asia was the largest continent that covered many different cuisines. He said he hated them all. I started to name out some of the more popular cuisines and he was pretty insistent that he preferred American food. I told him that when we are back together at the Abrome facility that he can join us on our treks around the city to sample different types of cuisines for lunch.

Facilitator Ariel followed up his coffee and read with another offering, a comic book reading that two Learners initially dropped in for. They began reading Sandman by Neil Gaiman, a graphic novel series about the inevitability of change. Once orientated (they googled a few summaries), they embarked on a plan to read a large section each week. While one Learner dropped off the call, the Learner who stuck it out until the end commented, “I guess this is just our thing!”

At 1:00 p.m. Facilitator Lauren went on a virtual plant walk with the Learner who also dropped in for the comic book reading. It felt really nice to be outside even though we are stuck meeting remotely during risk stage level five. During the plant walk offering Facilitator Lauren and the adolescent Learner discovered that spring greens are popping up all over! Stinging Nettles were the most exciting find, followed by Cucumber Plant and Cleaver!