The kids went back to school yesterday. And there was an early morning flurry in the kitchen. But I missed it. I was still in bed catching up after a restless night. It really does come in waves. On Saturday, I found myself submerged again. I’ve tried putting all kinds of different names on it but I think it’s an unfurling. It’s painful.
Covid-19 Lockdown Level 2 came into effect last Thursday. And on Friday, Sausage had a friend round to bake chocolate brownies and then went off out for a sunset picnic. Mr Choc met his mates after work for a bike ride, a bite, and a beer, and Snoop also took off on his bike to catch up with a friend or two. That left Mrs Choc and I thrashing out solutions to the world’s problems and singing along to Huey Morgan’s Yacht Party playlist whilst preparing the most enormous evening meal. The biggest yet. Only to find that when it came time to dish it up, there was no one there to eat it.
We’ve been taking a family photo every supper time since the beginning of lockdown and on Friday, for the first time in 54 days, there was only two of us in it. We weren’t alone for long though and one after another, the more adventurous Chocs drifted back in with tales of a world outside these four walls. They all looked slightly bewildered from their experiences. But it was exciting. And strange. For all of us, I think.
The same flurry of activity filled the house on Saturday morning as everyone busied themselves getting ready for whatever they had planned for the day. And in the midst of it all, the wave sucked me back under as I realised that I couldn’t get moving in the way I wanted to until at least the next stage of lockdown easement. I felt sorry for myself, angry and frustrated, as I saw the people around me seemingly being pulled towards the shore by a change in the tide. I also made the mistake of using Google to look into the future of world travel and what it means to have a British passport in times of Covid-19. It didn’t look good. And so my tantrum, because that’s what it was, caused me to sink.
The truth of it is, or at least one of the truths of it is, I had become comfortable in lockdown. Which sounds ridiculously contrary when reading back through my last few posts. But I’ve decided that this is the nature of waves so am going to resist trying to maintain any kind of continuity in that respect. I had become comfortable in lockdown because there were so very few challenges to face in terms of interacting with the world. In the past I often commented on how gentle life became just by stepping out of London for the weekend. Then found that it was even more gentle when I stepped out of work and out of England altogether. Lockdown has been difficult for a myriad of reasons, but it has also been gentle. I’m on a break from a holiday. And the toughest thing I’ve had to face in the last two months, aside from the occasional squirrel running rampant inside my head, has been grocery shopping. I always need a lie down after that. So, stepping back into the world again, with confidence, is going to take a little time. The future is unknown. I guess it always has been.
But now it is Tuesday and I’m spat out again. I ended up having a wonderful making-sense-of-it-all weekend tramping through Bottle Lake Forest with another pair of faraway friends that I know from London and who live here in Christchurch. Bubbles are beginning to mingle all around New Zealand and although I feel tentative about this unfurling, it does feel like breathing again. It feels like relief.
This morning I went for a run. It was still dark and icy-cold outside and I woke up feeling like Christmas must surely be just around the corner. But I had a Zoom catch-up scheduled for 7:30am and, as I’d been awake since 6, decided to get a run in first. I ran up the hill. It’s the sixth time (I’m counting) I’ve done it without stopping for views or for puffing and panting. I now pant and run. And I’m as pleased as punch with myself. I feel like I’m in training for something but I’m not sure quite what. Maybe for life after lockdown.
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