When your life is an episode of “The Floor Is Lava”

If you’ve seen “The Floor Is Lava” on Netflix, you know how it works.

A team of friends or family members races to get across an obstacle course decorated like a household room, working together and trying not to fall into the red liquid floor. Fall into the lava, and you’re out of the game.

When we watch the show, I am always rooting for people to fall in. I’m not sure what that says about me. But it’s entertaining. Sometimes the people who succeed are the ones who seemed the less likely to make it. There are so many things that can go wrong, it almost seems miraculous that anyone manages to get across the room.

Some days my life is an episode of “The Floor Is Lava.” I look ahead at the day and think I know which parts will be easy and which will be most challenging. Then the day begins, and I realize I was right about some things and misjudged others. Suddenly I’m leaping through the day trying not to fall.

I have five minutes to get lunch together for the children, and no one can decide what they want to eat.

I’m in an important meeting when I realize I can’t hear a thing because people around me are reaching for nerf guns and borrowing my phone so they can run and chase buzzards out of the backyard.

We’re waiting for a delivery to arrive, and it lands on the front porch just as a thundering downpour moves in. Chaos ensues.

Some days are crazy with emotional and physical obstacles—along with unbelievable expectations that meals will be served at normal times. Some days I think it would be easier if the floor were, in fact, lava. Instead, we are out of Double Noodle soup and there’s a fly buzzing around the living room and I realize I have to get to a meeting I didn’t know I had.

The floor is lava.

But we always make it to the end of the day intact. And, when I’m looking back on the day, I realize there were moments when my children demonstrated kindness and patience and love. I realize that we found some time to laugh. I realize that—even if the younger half of the family consumed too many video games and pieces of candy and I’ve brewed way too much coffee—everyone seems to be thriving. I think about how grateful I am that we’re together on this obstacle course of life.

This week we learned that our children won’t be going back to a physical school before February 2021. I was hoping they would be online for the fall the way that you hope that the tree that just fell on your car didn’t do too much damage. My husband and I want our children back in school so badly—but not during this pandemic. Right now, we want them home.

The announcement hit hard, though, as it told us we are looking at (at least) six more months of relatively unstructured home time. Will they learn anything? Will they have friends? Will we be able to make it through a whole semester of online learning? The lava floor started creeping up around my ankles.

This time around, I tell myself, we will make a better plan. We will create study spaces and focus on schedules and maybe ask a sitter to keep everyone on track. Maybe this time we will be better. Maybe I will care more. Maybe I will care less—if that’s even possible.

Most likely, we will just take it one day at a time. One obstacle at a time. We’ll try not to fall into the lava. We will lean on our teachers, who tried so hard to keep us moving forward last spring. Will we succeed? I hope so. And I suspect we’ll make some happy crazy family memories along the way.

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