My twelve year old is still in Jerz (aka camp) as Ruby prepares to return to Boston for the second half of her junior year. I was open to Rocky spending time In Jerz, the house he is at is big and there are more people for him to stare at while they eat. I realize without him home with me, I’ve lost my routines. Of walking him three times a day and of waking up at eight and of hearing his patter as I walk around the eight hundred square feet of my home. I haven’t left my apartment in days. I haven’t seen a friend in real life even longer. I have only worked and studied and written, Eaten pasta and watched Mr. Mayor several times, which I love. Routines are key to survival for me during this pandemic. Now that I know I will be in semi quarantine for another six months until I am eligible for the vaccine, I have settled for delayed hope. I see my body evolving when I don’t get at least the bare minimum of steps in—with Rocky home I could get up to five thousand steps a day, each of his walks logging 1500 or so plus whatever else I get in there. But without him home, even the tenuous thread of that has been fractured And while I talk about loneliness, him being at camp has revealed more than that to me: what being alone looks like, truly does without a pet or a roommate or a partner or a child around and I’m here to tell you that I am not into it. So I’m looking forward to Rocky coming home in a week from camp and getting back to my routine and not sleeping until ten every day and staying up way too late and all the things that have been thrown off kilter while he has been away.