 Welcome to Longmont Voices and Vision, a project of Longmont public media. In the midst of the darkest period in our lives, when we're bombarded 24 hours a day with news of the coronavirus and the human and economic carnage it's causing in our society, we're challenged to cope with our fears and anxieties, we're remaining hopeful about what lies on the other side of this crisis. This project presents an opportunity for Longmont residents to share with others how they're adjusting to new realities of social distancing and the kind of future they hope to experience on the other side of the crisis. I'm Tim Waters, host of these conversations in a Longmont public media volunteer. In this series I'll be asking Longmont residents, many of them your friends and neighbors, three questions. What are you doing to get through this crisis? Even though we cannot be together right now, how are we staying connected to friends and families? And what's the future you are hoping to see and experience on the other side of this crisis? I hope you'll stay with this series and enjoy listening to your friends and neighbors and learn from them how they're getting through and what they're looking forward to in a new reality on the other side. Alice, thank you so much for your willingness to contribute to the Longmont Voices and Vision Project. Each of these interviews starts by giving all of us a chance to learn a little bit about who's being interviewed. So tell us about you and what you do and then we'll get into my questions. Hello and thank you for this opportunity. My name is Alice Seldenfuss and I work for Hope Homeless Outreach. I'm a retired educator of 32 years and this was my next calling to help those who are less fortunate and need some assistance with housing and resources. I've been with Hope Homeless Outreach providing encouragement now for six years and presently I operate our sheltering system that we operate out of two churches. There's never a time when we don't need what you do every day and every night, day in and day out. If there was ever a time where it was amplified, it's right now in what we're going through. So thanks not only for your contributions to this interview and this project, but to what you do day in and day out. For folks who need the best we can bring for sure. Alice, you know I'm going to ask you three questions. The first of the three. Given the fact that we're in a period of time that none of us have ever experienced before, we're having to learn our way through and we're having to do that with all kinds of uncertainties and unknowns and the fears or the anxieties that go along with that. How are you getting yourself through this kind of unprecedented period of time where we're having to stay indoors, live with, stay at home or safe at home orders and all of the confusion that goes with that? I was scared to death when Corona virus hit. And the more I learned about COVID-19, the more afraid I became. But I was blessed that I had employment that even though I was on the front line, walking up to strangers, taking their temperature, asking them health questions. I had a group of people that I could talk to. I had my husband at home and then I was leaving the house to go to the shelter and work with shelter staff who were kind of putting their trust in me that we were going to get through this. And if we wore masks and gloves, we'd be okay. So I did get to interact with people. And then I noticed that at home, I'm the oldest of seven. My husband is a sibling of four. We noticed that our siblings started texting more and being more sensitive. And us ourselves were more sensitive to I wonder how my brother's doing. I wonder how my sister's doing. She had surgery. I should check on her. And I think it made us want to take care of each other. Well, of all the things that could be occurring during this time, greater attention and careful one another's one of the good ones. You know, my second question is in this time of physical separation from one another and social distancing. In times when we can't be together that we want to stay connected with one another, we want to stay connected with our siblings and family. How are you staying connected with family and friends? You mentioned texting. That's part of an answer. What else? Well, I have to say this is kind of funny, but one of my feeling kind of low nights. When I was worried about people who are not connected, I work with a lot of folks who experience mental health issues. And I feel like this is an area we need to concentrate on folks and we need more communication and one-on-one help at this time. I found the simplest thing of walking outside at 8 p.m. and howling such a connection to my community, Longmont, Colorado. It was so liberating to let out a sound from my mouth. Not only that, but a silly one. And then here other people doing the same. And then I noticed the bagpipers in the newspaper and across the country, people doing other things, music and dancing and all kinds of creativity that are kind of connecting people. Well, the third question I'm going to ask is, given all we're dealing with right now that the presumption is underlying this third question, that we're going to come out of this pandemic at some point and we'll settle into a new normal. We're not certain what that new normal is going to be. The presumption is that whatever it is, life's going to be different than it was before the pandemic. So this is a moment where we have a chance to envision a preferred future and then make some decisions about what are we willing to do to help create it. So for you, what's the preferred future on the other side of the pandemic to see in which you're willing to help create? I'm willing to help create more mental health assistance for everyone, not just folks who you think about, who sit down with a therapist and they're on medication, but all of us who need just somebody to connect with. I also think we are all going to have to do simple things. We're all going to have to always wash our hands more. That's just going to be our new normal is that even though our grandmothers and our mothers and our parents taught us, wash your hands before dinner, it's going to be the new normal of wash your hands a couple of times during the day or a few times during the day. Be cognizant of being in large groups. I would like to see that grocery stores and department stores continue keeping aware of how many people are in large groups in their stores. That might be something we could manage easier. I'm not sure. But yeah, I think, I think we're just all, I'm hoping we all care for each other just a little bit more than we did before. Alice, thank you so much again for your contribution to this project and again for all of your contributions to the community and those who need you most. Stay safe in this period. Yeah, stay safe. Take care of yourself, your family and we're able to come out from our stay at home or safe at home orders as we'll cross. I'm certain many times the community. Absolutely. I'll share. Watch your hands. We'll do. Claire. Thank you for your willingness to contribute to the lawnmower voices and vision project. We're pleased that you were willing to spend some time for this interview. Each of them has started by learning a little bit about the people who are interviewing. So tell us about Claire. I'm a 12 year old student. at Altona Middle School. I like to play soccer and basketball and I like to hang out with my friends, but not during quarantine. Well, the reference to quarantine kind of sets up the first of these three questions I'm going to ask you. As a 12 year old, you know, you've never experienced anything like this. As a 71 year old, I've never experienced anything like this, and no one on the planet today has experienced what we're going through right now. There have probably been times in history like the Spanish flu 100 years ago, where people experienced this kind of uncertainty and the concerns that go with it. So it's new for all of us and all of us are trying to figure out how to get ourselves through this. So tell us how you're getting yourself through this period of unknowns and uncertainty and the fears that go with that. Yeah, well, daily life so kind of goes on. So we do, I do have online soccer practice. I do have online school, but it's all from home. So I'm definitely spending a lot more time on screen and I'm definitely like going outside into my backyard a lot more. And I have been doing things that I don't normally do on a daily basis like helping my mom cook or cleaning around the house. So it's definitely a different experience, but life still kind of goes on just different. Day to time. As we're quarantined, we're all physically separated from one another in ways that we've never experienced. Social distancing, even when we can be in proximity to others, we can't have the same kind of physical connection that we've had. So we have to be a little more creative about how we stay connected with family and friends. What are you doing to stay connected with family and friends? I FaceTime my friends, Texla, sometimes use Snapchat. And there's this app called House Party. And it's like FaceTime, but you can play games on FaceTime. And so I'm using that a lot with some of my friends. And sometimes we put on FaceTime and we watch a movie together. Claire, I've interviewed about 60 people as part of this project so far. You're the first one has mentioned House Party as an app. So I'm guessing the others would like to know more about House Party as an app. My third question for you is this. It's really focused on the future more than kind of what we're dealing with in the moment. And the presumption, the underlying presumption for this question is that whatever was normal before the pandemic won't be normal after the pandemic. There'll be a new normal that will emerge. We just don't know what that's going to be. But the question is, are there aspirations for what you'd like it to be? What would you like to see as the new normal? And what do you want to help create as the new normal on the other side of this pandemic? I know it won't be the new normal. I know it'll probably be completely different, especially right as we get out of quarantine. But I hope that it's the same, but with a few different ideas, I guess. So I hope that like delivery workers in grocery or stalkers and workers, they are devalued and we really value them because they really work very hard for our community. And I hope that everybody is a little bit more cautious with like, I think everybody will be more like, oh, I don't need this. And I don't need this because I've noticed that like, even with me, because I'm still a kid, but people like tend to impulse buy and people tend to be like, oh, I'm going to go over to Walmart. So I can get this random thing I don't really need. Well, you can still do that, but I hope people learn that they don't always need to do that. That sounds like intentionality, people being more intentional about what they're going to do and what they're going to consume and maybe more thoughtful approach to consumerism. Any other thoughts? I just hope that we all know as a community and come out of this stronger. I think the potential is there, but we're going to need you and your generation to know that that happened. So thanks for your willingness to be part of this project again. Thanks for I know that that you make many contributions to your school because I I know just a little bit about you. So thanks for that. Thanks for this. Take care of yourself. Stay safe and help help your mom and dad and your brother take care of the family. You say safe too. Thanks. Bye. Bye. Bob rogo. Thank you for being a contributor to the long month voices and vision project. Each of these interviews has begun by learning something about the person being interviewed. So tell us about Bob rogo. And because I know a little bit about your background, your history, tell us not only what you're doing now, what did you do before you turn the page to retirement? What are you doing in retirement? And then we'll get into some questions. Okay, well, thanks first of all for this opportunity, Tim, to share this with you and respond to your questions. Well, I'm going to go way back to when I was born, but I'm not going to take, I'm not going to give you every detail, but I was born and raised in western New York between Niagara Falls and Buffalo, Northern Wanda. In case some of the people who view this, they may be able to connect with that. My family was predominantly public school teachers or educators of one sort or another. And so when I graduated from college, I drifted into education taught school for four years, junior high school back in western New York. And then by a stroke of luck, I found out about a, this would be late 1960s, I found out about a job or a career titled school psychologists. And when I learned about that, that's exactly what I wanted to get into. And so that caused me to come to Colorado in 1970 with my wife at that time. And we settled into Boulder. And I went to the CU and got my license for being a school psychologist at Colorado, which then as far as employment took me for a short time to a Boulder County job, servicing and supporting individuals, basically from birth in a sense to adulthood, who had cognitive challenges. And then in 1975, I obtained a position as an employee in St. Rain Valley School District. So I've worked in St. Rain from 1975 until I retired in 2002 as a school psychologist, but also in the late, pardon me, in the, I see about 1990, I became a director of special education. So 15 years roughly as a school psychologist, and then about 12 years as a director of special education. So that's my professional background. Retired in 2002, I met my wife, Diane Bachman at the time. Some individuals might know her, maybe had her in school for that matter, that they're listening to this or will listen to this. She was an educator also. And between us, we have three children. I contributed two to our relationship and she contributed one. All adults now. And from that, we have three grandchildren. So we're very fortunate. And it's been a good relationship. And I'm very pleased to have met Diane in many ways. So since retirement, really, my time has been occupied outside of travel and the usual stuff that retired people do with volunteering. And I'm happy to say that I got associated with the overseen your living community, been on that board for just about 10 years here, given another month, seven of those years, I've been the chairperson. And I just want to highlight the fact that during this tenure, our board has, well, they have supported and continue to support the building, not the building, but four brand new skilled nursing homes on our campus over on Hoover near Mountain View. And they're progressive and we're very proud of that. But I will soon be exiting the board because of bylaws. And then I will decide what I'm going to do from there. But that's basically a quick summary, I hope, of my background. You can always go to city council after that. So thank you. You just described decades of service to Maluma. So thanks for not only your contributions to this project, but for decades of service to the children and the adults of this community and to Boulder County. And if I can jump in, Tim, I'm sorry that didn't interrupt, but Diane and I live in Longmont. I want to make the point of that we have since 1992. And we both just just feel like we found a home. In many ways, Longmont reflects many of the positive things about where I grew up as a kid. And same for Diane, although she grew up in a larger city than I did, so in Kansas. But we have a real love for Longmont and just feel that it's a wonderful place to live. So well, like you and so many others, you belong in Longmont. So all right, you know, I'm going to ask three questions. First of these three questions is this. In a period of time, unlike any of us have ever experienced in terms of stay at home orders and now safe at home orders and all the restrictions on what we can do, can't do and all the uncertainties, the unknowns and whatever the anxieties are that go along with that. Everybody's had to figure out how to get themselves through and we're not, we're not through this yet. So how are you getting yourself through this experience associated with this pandemic? That's a good question because I think initially there was sort of a randomness to our daily routine. And I think what has evolved for us that's worked for Diane and I were pretty structured people and was to develop a routine. And not that we don't deviate it, but it basically we get up early and we're up by seven o'clock in the morning or earlier sometimes. Exercise is a part of our routine. I think that's critical. We do run errands periodically during the week within the safety standards that are set. Examples, we go to the grocery store. We also find that connecting with friends and relatives on a pretty regular basis has really helped. Diane and I like, I'm sort of going to jump around on this a bit. We like competition, both of us. And so we have friendly games of cards and things that help. We are catching up on TV shows that we put on the back burner. Let's see what else. Family members, as I said, that's very important to stay in contact. Lots of conversation we find we're having. You know, we always have been conversant, but this has provided an opportunity for more in-depth conversations and things. And being retired, obviously, we had the gift of time to begin with in some ways. But this has increased that, I guess, the significance of that gift. And so I would say, yeah, that's basically it. I would just advocate that people develop a routine and try to utilize that as a foundation for their day. It just, it helps. Well, you mentioned part of that routine is staying, is connecting with family and friends. How are you doing that in a time when you can't be together, but you want to stay connected? Okay. And I'll back up the last thing is both Diane and I are still involved in volunteer work. And that does absorb some of our time during a week. How we do that is, I think this is going to be repetitions of what I'm sure many people of the way they're handling things, but we do a lot of phoning still, but we certainly have had our share of Zoom meetings, gatherings with friends for the volunteer work and certainly with family. So, yes, the electronic connection is a big part of our lives now. Believe it or not, more of my wife than I, she still writes letters and sends cards out through the postal service as a way, and she gets responses from that. So we utilize that too. But it's primarily through phone, primarily through the Zoom FaceTime connection. And then we have had some social gatherings, small scale, like no more than another couple where we've spaced ourselves in open areas, such as my wife right now is meeting with two lady friends at Roosevelt Park. So, and they will be sitting at least six feet, if not more apart, but they still can hear each other. So it's been an effort to figure out. I mean, we miss the day-to-day contact with people. We found that out pretty quickly. And so we had to really, once again, develop a schedule. There's some people that I call on a weekly, maybe every two-week basis that are having some challenges and then family members we call regularly too. So that's part of our schedule, and that's how we're dealing with this. Well, you're finding ways to get through, you're finding ways to stay connected. So the last question is, while we're still in living with all the constraints of being experiencing a pandemic, we can anticipate that we won't go on forever, that there'll be another side to this whole experience. And the last question, the presumption is that whatever we experience, there's going to be a new normal that will settle into some kind of normal, but life will be different on the other side of the pandemic. That's the presumption. And so with that, the question is, what would you like to see in the new normal? What's your preferred future that you'd like to both experience and help create once we're on the other side of this pandemic? Okay, I've sort of put this in two categories, maybe three. One is it's sort of what are the lessons learned from this? What are people going to reflect back on to take out of this that, you know, that they experienced that they said, wow, that was really, that was really great. We did that. And this is both on an interpersonal level in terms of friendships, but it's also within families. There are opportunities now, I view, that for people to really experience if they haven't, or to begin with, or experience on a greater level, the possibility of connecting with their kids, parents, for instance, connecting with their kids and doing things outside of watching TV together. You know, some of the typical things, maybe even dealing with homework in some, for some families, but some other activities, not that those aren't valuable, it's particularly the doing the homework with kids. I think that's very valuable. So I would hope that people would recognize that and try to ingest that into their daily routines once we're past the present or more into whatever that looks like in the future. So that involves families, that involves with friends, because I'm a strong believer that what we're here for is relationships, and to help improve other people's lives. And that leads me to my second point. You know, I have been guilty of saying, well, we're all in the same boat. And people say that casually, and then someone said, no, we're not in the same boat, we're experiencing the same storm is the way that I've heard this. And that just clicked with me and said, yeah, we aren't in the same boat, because we all have come from different sort of advantages and disadvantages in our personal situations. But Diane and I can say we're most fortunate in view of what we have presently and where we are in our lives in terms of time and time commitments and things like that. So I would hope that out of this comes a increased sensitivity to the needs and the situations of others who are less fortunate. And that that results in more caring, more caring behaviors towards those individuals as well as groups of individuals that are in that situation that don't have as much. And that speaks to volunteer work in my mind, where people can become more active in circles that provide supports for people more need. Now you say, what would I hope? And I think you're asking for maybe a part for translation of all of that. The reason that Diane and I love Longmont is number one diversity exists in Longmont. And I see that as a real gift. It does present challenges, but it's a real gift for the people that live in this community and certainly nearby communities. I did not come from a town that had diversity, other than at least not ethnic diversities and so on. But I have learned that there's real value in living in a community with people of a diverse background. So I would, I'd like what's happening in general with the city and the direction it's going. I mean, I think that Longmont stands out as a model, not that there's not a lot of room for improvement, but for a community that really tries on a community level to help others that are in need and to absorb them into the community as true peers, community peers. So I would, I think the city council obviously plays a big role, we tax payers, you know, just have to take notice of that, that that's such an important thing and help to promote and support initiatives that the city can do to continue to improve the lives of others that are less fortunate. And those are broad strokes. And I recognize that when this is over there are going to be certainly a segment of the population that are going to sort of just fall back into whatever their old routines were and get caught up, be it with their work and whatever, and lose sight of what they've had an opportunity to experience in many cases. And I'm not talking across the whole spectrum of the population, but many, many individuals have had a real opportunity or having a real opportunity and to look at the positives of what's going on and that can translate then, and I hope to continue behavior, but I also recognize there could be some people that are going to fall into the old, just the old set of how they operate it. And so I just, I just, being an optimist, I just hope that vast majority of people are, you know, will be more insightful now and then, and find more balance in our lives and recognize that that's important for everyone. So that's, that I've sort of rambled a little there, but I hope there are some. Well, Bob, there's always enough pessimism in the world. Now's the time for some optimism, as we anticipate the future that we'd like to create. So thank you for that optimism. Thank you for your contribution to this project. Go ahead. Yeah. Well, knowing you're on the council, the leadership issue is extremely important in the council are certainly some of our leaders in the community and, and, you know, it goes beyond just our community goes all the way up to the national level. So it's important that we get leaders who are sensitive to, yeah, to what I want the community to look like. I'm doing this with a volunteer hat on. So council stuff is outside of this, outside of this project, but I do appreciate the comment. I appreciate your contribution to this project and I deeply appreciate decades of service and contributions to this community. So thanks to you. Thanks to your, your bride, Diane, and when we are able to, to resume at least physical proximity to one another, I'll look forward to that. And when we can shake hands and, and being in physically together again. Thanks. Okay. Well, thanks, Tim. Appreciate it.