Warning….if you’re looking for an uplifting read, then this one isn’t for you. Just give it a miss.
I am not in the best of places right now. Like everyone else, I guess, this whole thing just gets to me. Early on I went through the Dunkirk spirit bit of the lockdown. That all for one, one for all thing that gripped the whole country. And that was fine for awhile, but now it’s starting to wear a bit thin, and I’m noticing that many are beginning to be quicker to anger or at least irritability.
I guess that’s the normal way of these things. When people’s lives are turned upside down there is bound to be a reaction. I just feel I’m surrounded by a quietly simmering rage…with a smile on the surface of it. Everybody is pretending to be okay…really.
My personal issue is that a few years ago I took the decision to pull myself out of the rut that I felt I was stuck in. I had moved to another part of the country, leaving behind all of the contacts and social outlets I had. I don’t make new relationships easily. So for quite awhile I became isolated and shutdown. I had to make a conscious effort to build a new social network. It took me several years to build it, but slowly and surely I got there. My weekly diary began to fill up to the point where it became difficult to fit everything in. As a result, my general mood lifted. I realised that I needed other people, (that is, people other than my immediate family) and the activities that go with those relationships.
Then came lockdown, and everything that I’d worked hard to build up was suddenly knocked down. Okay, things are slowly beginning to open up again, but it’s not the same. Meeting up with people while having to be mindful of staying clear of them, holding conversations while wearing masks, cleaning everything down after it’s been handled. No one considers that to be even close to normal life.
I don’t want to sound self pitying, but I feel I’m drifting into an institutionalised state of being. It’s getting harder to motivate myself into doing anything. I’m sure many people feel the same way. Even this blog post is the first one I’ve done in weeks.
I’m sure I’ll climb out of this at some point; something will shift, hopefully. It usually does.
Navigating Hades. 
Just back from cat-sitting in Hampshire – very therapeutic week. Good to have something new to think about. Everything you write here resonates with me – the novelty of having all that time that lockdown delivered as it snatched away everything that we had rather taken for granted in our lives affected us all in so many ways. For those who had to work it brought exhaustion, to others boredom and isolation.
Communication in new ways keeps some of us together – zoom, facetime, phone calls and messaging are invaluable for me. But it was the little things too that were very powerful – the young neighbours who called to ask what they could do for us; the local friends who invited us round to their gardens; the delivery of cakes from the local church; the camaraderie with others when we were out walking and the list goes on. So positives needed to be added to a long list of negatives.
This will end, as you say, and something of our old lives will be welcomed back, possibly with a new appreciation. The priority will be what we have, rather than what we have lost.
Then a get-together must be on our agenda!
LikeLiked by 1 person