I had to jet to the school to collect the older kid, ejected from school after a classmate reported a positive coronavirus test.

She and some others were deemed "close contacts" by the school, and have been sent home to quarantine until testing can confirm she doesn't have it, too.

I hadn't started my workday yet, but had finished a cup of coffee and started in on checking messages. I went to the school and fetched her. She was in fine, but maybe a little bummed, spirits coming out of the school office to meet me. I think it was that bit of relief in seeing me. By the time we walked to the Jeep, she was sobbing because she was going to miss her friends, and everyone was going to get sick, and someone might die...

I tried to comfort her, but she was a bit gone. I told her that while death is possible, especially for healthy children, it's not very common. She and her friends were unlikely to even develop symptoms, especially the symptoms or impacts that can kill you. I explained that the reason to separate is to prevent spreading it, and try to end it that way, as well as ending it with vaccines. If her friend, who was out yesterday, exposed her classmates when she was last at school on Wednesday, that they might be carrying the virus to others. Having the virus doesn't mean getting sick, and in probably more cases than we're aware, that's likely to be what happens. But you can still share it with others, because all you have to do is breathe. Being unlucky enough to inhale some virus in the moisture that someone else exhaled is how it spreads.

What worked is that I promised we could go to McDonald's for lunch. Their cheeseburgers are her favorites. I'm much less of a fan than I have been in the past, and have really appreciated that we've been avoiding McD's with our intern hosting. Probably a handful of meals in the last few months, which is great. It's a tremendous drop from the convenience and other bad excuses we'd use to eat there once or more each week. But if cheeseburgers stop a 10-year old from crying, I'll cave. Well, when it's for such a shocker as this, not just any time the kids might cry--normally I don't deal with terrorists, but this is a fear and sadness moment, not struggling to get their way through noise and discomfort.

So she's home for at least the next five or six days, because the clock started on Wednesday, their last contact. The school (driven by the state) rules are that tests don't count until after day 5, which means Monday. We get tested every Saturday, so that'll be a nice comforting check for "probably not infected," as that's a little early on the incubation period if Wednesday was the day. It won't be the test that matters, though.

I contend that since the friend was home sick on Thursday, seemingly testing on that day and reporting the results received on Friday (so the story goes--trickled through the school and gossip channels), that they were probably contagious all week or sooner, so ours could have been being exposed all that time.The CDC notes that incubation can be from 2-14 days, but typically symptoms appear 4-5 days after infection, and contagion starts about 48 hours after the infection. So that earliest 2 days should be at the latest today, and at the earliest, on Wednesday. If the friend was home sick on Thursday, they were exposed prior to Monday, and likely contagious earlier. No blame, just unwinding the media-based understanding, paired with some graph theory and statistical analysis skills I have. Trying to protectively or optimistically expand the exposure period so that we can feel something comfortable with tomorrow's test results, whichever way it comes out. 

Regardless, the school rules dictate a 7 day quarantine, and have rules about early timing for negative testing. So if she's tested on Monday (appointment already made) and finds she's negative, she could return to school on Wednesday. If she reports positive we need to wait until some days after a negative test, or a couple consecutive negative tests, or something more complicated...we'll cross that detail if we need to later.

I think that's how it works out.

From one perspective, this is good timing, as we're heading into the last week of school before the Winter Break. On the other hand, if she doesn't get to return next week, by positive tests or other school timing impacts (like maybe someone else reports a positive test over the weekend, which might move that "close contact" counter to Friday), she's going to have three weeks of break. If it was me, I'd think that'd be fantastic, unless I ended up actually sick. Three weeks kicked out of work sounds like a "I can get some stuff done, or relax, or both" dream. Even if I had to quarantine at home, in a room alone, separated from kids and dogs and laptops!

From the other perspective, these will be long weeks, as we're both still working, and she get so bored so quickly. We'll try not to cave and let her iPad the whole time. She might have some remote learning to do for school (the sent a Chromebook loaner home), so we need to get that to happen. That struggle, keeping her engaged and trying to do it in a way that allows us to continue doing our necessary jobs, is going to be taxing for the days she's home next week. The following weeks are already planned (and warned at our workplaces). And this is more like I'd expect if I was quarantined but not sick or at least not symptomatic; I'd be stuck at home, maybe locked in a room alone, probably in the office, with electronics, and continuing to work when I could.

All that to say that for the next three weeks, we'll have at least one extra body at home, and in all likelihood will be doing even less than we already were, just to be safe and responsible.

Fingers crossed that the tests tomorrow come out in our favor.

Everyone seems healthy.