Are you masked up for reopening the country? I am. I have a few masks, and a few have stories behind them. Naturally I admire the people who have broken out the sewing machines and made ten or ten gazillion masks for people, but my crafting projects have been sort of sketchy right now (I have a total of eight needle felting creatures in various stages of unfinished, and another afghan–yes, couldn’t stop crocheting–almost completed), so I made do and improvised a bit.
My office had packs of masks and gloves ready to hand out to staff in the last week we were there. Rather than hand out to each desk, they put them in bins in the lobby. I didn’t realize there were three to a pack, and I had grabbed an extra just in case somebody in my office missed the bus. Those packs went like emergency rations at zero hour, and an admin is expected to always be the go-to for just about everything, so I felt ready.
Since in the end I wound up being one of the last ones out of the building, I took both packs home with me. The extra pack ultimately went into the hands of a local police officer who had dropped by our block for something; I told him I didn’t need the extras, but they and the EMT staff might.
When I broke the seal of the first N-95 mask of the remaining pack and put it on to go shopping, one elastic broke. Well, I figured, at least I would know mine on sight. A good Girl Scout knot job later, and I was on my way.
Having saved the remaining masks in the pack for however long the pandemic might last, I decided to try improvising an extra or two via YouTube videos. The t-shirt idea was a good one, but as I was looking in my pile of tees I realized I had a pair of underwear that looked rather more appealing. In fact, the waistband was better fitting, so I hacked off the lower half containing the crotch and used the elastic leg bands to cobble together the ties for the back, gathering them at the side seams for a comfy fit.
I placed another order for two masks, but they’re on back order; a third, a gaiter, arrived this week, and I love it. It’s like having a turtleneck that is cool in the summer. With sixty degrees being the average temperature outside in our slow end to a fake spring, I have not had a chance to see how cool I will remain with my breathing filtered through it, but it’s easy to keep on and pull up when “masking up” to enter a store,
Our office has provided guidelines for when to mask up when we return to the office, and fortunately I have a desk separated from the department and can breathe uninhibited air until I have to go into the corridors where others may cross my path. Since we are also instituting one-way transit in hallways, I don’t know how often that will actually happen; it may be comical to see various face coverings flipping up and down as people come and go everywhere.
Whatever your mask might be, remember that it will probably be temporary for now, but don’t toss them. They may still become useful in the fall and winter as flu makes a return engagement worldwide. Think of them as a strange new fashion trend.
Go check for some repurposed underwear.
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