Karen Task is a 52-year old single mom who lives with her son Shawn and her mother Elaine. She spends her days running a cleaning business and then goes home to her son and mother. “I haven’t stepped on the sand all summer,” she said. A friend suggested to Karen that she start a cleaning business in 2018, and today she has four employees. Summer is busy with lots of cleaning and laundry to do, and finding time to be with her son is hard. With COVID-19, and many people collecting unemployment benefits, it is difficult to find workers and that takes time away from her family. 

In November of 2020, Karen made the decision to move in with her mother, and step away from her winter rental and summer campground lifestyle with her son. “It was this one day that I thought I had enough of the business,'' she said. However, her active spirit pushes her to continue moving forward — even if it means sacrificing time with her son.