Documenting Life in Bovina During the COVID-19 Pandemic

I hope everyone is staying safe and healthy during these extraordinary times. 

My job as town historian is to document not only Bovina’s past but its present. I’ve started collecting information on life in Bovina during the COVID-19 pandemic and how our lives have changed. 

One thing I am doing differently is the way I handle my mail. As the picture below demonstrates, when I get my mail, I review it quickly, put it in this basket and spray it lightly with a disinfectant. I immediately wash my hands and then wait three days to look at it more closely. I also disinfect the mailbox handle and door. Maybe I’m being overly cautious but I’m not starting a debate here on the wisdom of this. I’m just demonstrating how one thing in my life has changed due to the pandemic. We all are doing things differently from what we used to call our normal. I’d like to see examples of this in your life. 

It would be helpful for me and for future Bovina historians if you would share your experiences:

• How is the outbreak of COVID-19 affecting your daily life? 
• Has sickness visited your home or family? 
• Did you have to close a business, lay people off, shut down an organization? 
• Have you been laid off or furloughed? 
• Are you a medical professional working to curb the disease? 
• Are you an employee who has continued to work in an ‘essential’ commercial or government capacity? 
• Are you working from home? 
• How are your children dealing with schooling at home? 
• How are you and your family coping with social distancing and isolation? 
• How are you staying in touch with family members elsewhere? 
• Are you using social media options (Zoom, Facetime, etc) or the ‘old fashioned’ telephone or U.S. Mail to do this? 
• Are there stories of joy amidst the fear, uncertainty and sadness? 

Please send your thoughts, stories, observations, photographs, short video or audio clips to me at bovinahistorian@gmail.com. I will archive these items in the town historian files (I also will save a set at the Delaware County Historical Association). 

While you are sharing your stories and pictures, please be sure you are following all the social distancing rules – don’t physically gather your family together for this if you have not been living with them. 

Please help me document how Bovina has dealt with this world-changing event so those who come after us will better understand how we addressed it locally.