A Covid Questionnaire Led to One Mom’s Existential Crisis
By: Anna Jadow
Rejected on 1/29/21
By the grace of some higher power (combined with an extremely well-organized staff), my 4-year-old has been attending in-person school since September. As any parent reading this essay knows, in order for a child to enter a school building in the era of Covid, a parent or guardian is required to fill out a questionnaire before the child’s arrival. The goal of the questionnaire is to ensure, to the extent possible, that no one entering the building has Covid. Everyone understands the necessity of the form, and filling it out is quick and painless. Or is it?
Back in January, my 13-year-old went back to school for the first time since March of 2020. Because I had grown accustomed to my preschooler’s Covid Questionnaire, I got cocky and zipped through my middle schooler’s form too quickly. As a result, I misunderstood one of the questions and answered it incorrectly, almost preventing my daughter from going to school. Remember how I said that filling out the form is quick and painless? It turns out that when your kids are in different schools and the questionnaires are different, the process is not so quick and painless after all.
Yes, I only have myself to blame. After all, I have plenty of time in the morning to sit in a quiet place and read the questions carefully, since my three kids (ranging in age from 4-13) are completely self-sufficient and don’t need me to wake them up, cook breakfast, pack lunch, select appropriate clothing, get them dressed, or walk them to school. And yet, despite my leisure-filled mornings (today I got a foot massage while munching on frozen peeled grapes that a James Beard award-winning chef prepared for me!) I struggle, as evidenced below.
The Covid Questionnaires begin in a straightforward manner:
1. Within the last 14 days, has your child or anyone in your household tested positive for Covid-19?
2. Within the last 14 days, have you been in close contact with a person confirmed to have Covid-19?
3. Does your child or anyone else in your household have a fever over 100°F?
4. Has your child or anyone in your household experienced any symptoms of Covid-19 in the past 14 days?
But then…
5. My child did not travel, OR if my child travelled from another state or country on the NYS Travel Advisory List, I attest that they completed the 10-day quarantine OR provided documentation to the school for two negative test results as specified by the NYS DOH.
Is this a question? Or a statement of fact? *dusts off law school diploma and begins legal research*
6. Have you not not travelled in the last 10 days to a state that is not not now, nor has ever not not been, contiguous with your state?
*Googles the rules of grammar and also which states are contiguous with New York*
7. Have you not not been in close contact with someone who was in close contact with, or could have been in close contact with, someone acting as a Covid vector?
* Googles “vector”*
8. Has your child not not had neither diarrhea nor, if yes, vomiting, either in the last 10 days or, if longer, two weeks before he or she had not not travelled to a non-contiguous state?
WHAAAAAAAAAA????
9. Is the child’s mother experiencing any symptoms of Covid, such as fatigue, headache, muscle aches, back pain, or neck pain?
Yes, clearly, but…
10. Did the child’s mother have to ask said child no fewer than 10 times to GET YOUR MASK ON BECAUSE WE ARE WALKING OUT THE DOOR IN TWO MINUTES?
Is it “fewer” or “less”? *dusts off college diploma (mom was an English major)*
11. How many times in the past 14 days has the child’s mother been contacted by a multi-level-marketing boss babe (“Hey, hot stuff!”) who offered the mother financial independence? How many times has said mother, despite swearing off MLM “schemes” for years, actually considered it this time, while picturing herself on a hot, sandy beach with The Duke of Hastings from Bridgerton? SCANDALOUS.
Now here’s where it gets really tricky…
12. On August 4th, 1991, did you unintentionally insult your counselor’s bad teeth?
13. If the answer to Question 12 is yes, did you attempt to apologize?
14. If the answer to Question 13 is either yes, no, or maybe, have you thought about said unintentional insult for the past 20 years?
15. If the answer to Question 14 is yes, please let us know who hurt you as a child.
Here’s how you know that a mom created the Covid questionnaire:
16. Has the child’s mother called out into the abyss “Calgon Take Me Away!” no fewer than 87 times since last March?
17. Is the child’s mother sick (not with Covid, but just generally Sick. Of. All. The. Bullshit)?
And, finally…
18. If a mom screams in the forest and no one is there to hear her, WHO IS THIS MOM AND CAN SHE TAKE ME WITH HER NEXT TIME?
And there you have it: a glimpse into this mom’s morning routine. I hope you can’t relate, but I imagine that you can. If so, I wish you Godspeed and I send you strength (but not too much strength, because I need most of it for myself. Sorry.)