COVID-19 Staff Stories
If you get to know me, you’ll quickly learn that I’m an introvert. I do enjoy interacting with people (including my wife, haha), but I do enjoy my solitude so the transition to working at home has been something of a euphoric experience.
Fears
I’ve never been much of a worrier. Growing up my mom would always say “Worrying about something isn’t going to change it”. Obviously, I’m human so I do have fears, but Covid-19 isn’t one of them. Also growing up as a Pastor’s son I would hear my dad constantly on calls to talk to people regarding health, funerals, hospital visits, etc. So while all the negative news is traumatic for most (which is understandable), I’ve learned how to deal with it.
Downsides
Nothing comes without its downsides. For me I really miss my Sunday routine which involved playing drums at church, having dinner with my in-laws and playing in my basketball league to end off the night. Also, we should have been in Jamaica last week for a family reunion trip which unfortunately had to be cancelled. Lastly, my grandpa is turning 100 in December and travel is looking bleak, but I’m remaining hopeful that we’ll be able to fly down (to Jamaica) to celebrate with him.
Upsides
I’m married to a wonderful woman and it’s great to spend our days working, eating, exercising, and praying together. Many people have joked about couples getting sick of each other, but we’re both really enjoying it. Aside from my love life, I’m getting a lot more sleep. I’m a night owl so it’s not unusual for me to go to bed around 2-3am. Because I don’t need to get ready in the mornings, I can squeeze in that extra hour of sleep before starting work which has been great.
My wife is an extrovert so we’ve been doing different things to help her interact with the outside world. One of her ideas was to start an Instagram mini-blog for couples during the quarantine (https://www.instagram.com/_thelovewemake/) so now I’m a part-time model haha.
Regarding work, things are great. Communication was a bit rocky at first since we didn’t have access to many tools outside of Slack, but now that we’ve added Discord communication couldn’t be better. Since many devs are introverted by nature, my team has really been enjoying the experience which has made my job as a manager really easy.
Overall I’m really enjoying the experience. I have a great wife, a job, a great team, my family is healthy, and I’m an introvert. This is heaven to me.