So that’s a little dramatic. BUT, he’s always had a sense of things, like a connection to the universe that I wonder at. My mother has that too, in some ways. (In fact, my mother picked out my husband for me when I was 17, but that’s an entirely different story for a different time.)

So as soon as we start hearing about the virus in January in China, my husband looks at me and says, “Sasha, this isn’t good.” He shakes his head. “It’s not going to happen,” he says.

“What not’s going to happen?” I say.

“Italy, honey, we’re not going to end up going to Italy.”

So this is where I’m like: But for realz honey? It’s in China. We’re going to Italy.

What are the chances that Italy would be “Stop 2” in the pandemic?

What. Are. The. Chances. Indeed.

So now we’re the proud owners of two stays at luxury hotels in Sorrento and in Florence. If anyone would like to use our rooms, they are available between May 7 and May 19.

On the upside, we all have updated passports. On the downside, we had to go through the process of all getting updated passports, which involved a cruel and unusual visit to the post office (also another story for another time).

I contacted both hotels maybe 5 or 6 weeks ago, before Italy was – you know – shut down. I expressed sympathy for their plight, asked for a refund. Both hotels were like “Oh, it’s totally safe here, nothing to worry about, come on in, the weather’s fine, there’s room for one more on this elevator” whahahahahaha.

When you think about how many mothers and how many fathers. All the people worrying, all the families.

I almost feel bad trying to get a refund because of what the economy must be like there now. (Keep in mind these were really nice hotels, not like mom and pop places. The last time I stayed in a hostel in my late twenties I told myself I will never travel again internationally unless I can afford a nice hotel. We all have our priorities.)

I really hope folks are taking this seriously. It’s almost unthinkable, and that’s where we went wrong. Many of us Gen-Xers grew up on a steady diet of apocalypse – if it wasn’t zombies it was attractive vampires, or creepy children ghosts or haunted islands, all manner of things that go bump in the night. It wasn’t hard for me to believe that this is real, but keep in mind that I did have my small stockpile of hazmat suits from when Ebola came around. I trend towards the slightly paranoid, and always figured that I’d rather spend a couple hundred bucks to not have to need to worry about preparation.

In related news, I have a lot of canned goods, and the children don’t like the broccoli cheese soup, so I have a lot of broccoli cheese soup.

A lot.

So I’m from Cleveland, right, and many years ago I was driving in downtown during a snowstorm and the traffic lights were out and it was my first real taste of anarchy. And I knew then how close we are were to disaster at any moment. People were defying the four way stop thing All Over the Place. I would like to take a moment to say that, as a public service announcement, when a traffic light is out, the four way stop is NOT a suggestion. It is what you MUST do to avoid a big freaking accident.

Pretty good analogy here only you don’t even have to take turns. Just don’t go out in public. #FlattenTheCurve Tune in next time when I reflect on working from home (or what I like to call “The Introvert’s Paradise”).

-Sasha