A year used to feel like a long time. At least it did when I was younger. Since entering my thirties, almost a decade ago (clinging on to this for my dear life), I’ve noticed several things that have noticeably got quicker as I get older: the time between new streaming platforms being created, the speed that my blood boils every time I see Boris Johnson on TV, and how I perceive each year as I gradually shuffle of this mortal coil.
As we approach a year since we entered our first lockdown I thought it would be worth taking the time to take a look back on how I spent my time coming to terms with living with Coronavirus and the various lockdowns.
So, what was it like at the start?
I remember this moment becoming real when we started talking at work about the prospect of getting sent home. We had watched the world leaders in America and the UK dismiss and ridicule the idea that Coronavirus would be a problem for us ‘proper freedom-loving’ countries. Boris Johnson said it was safe to shake hands with people right up to the moment when he nearly died from the virus. Trump ridiculously claimed a year ago yesterday that the total in the USA would soon be down to zero. I guess the 500,000+ people who have died in the US alone since aren’t available to comment on this assessment from the former Commander in Chief.
Donald Trump, one year ago today: “And again, when you have 15 people, and the 15 within a couple of days is going to be down to close to zero, that’s a pretty good job we’ve done…We’re going very substantially down, not up.” pic.twitter.com/Ax8vHY4OOG
— Josh Jordan (@NumbersMuncher) February 26, 2021
Naturally we were all sent home and told to work from home if we had the capacity. This seemed great at the outset. No supervision. Significantly shorter work commute. Breaks no longer meant having to dodge that one person you didn’t want to speak to. The reality of the situation began to set in after about a week later. Would my work be able to afford to keep paying me to work from home? Would I as a temporary worker be eligible for furlough if it became necessary? And did I actually find myself missing contact with people, including that one person I thought I wanted to avoid?
I was lucky enough to work for an organisation that guaranteed full employment and the ability to work from home for all of their staff. I think it’s important to recognise my good fortune in this matter when writing this piece, especially in the face of many people losing their jobs even to this day. Any complaints that follow in this piece must recognise the advantages that were afforded to me by this outcome.
Working from home comes with its challenges. We had to work out how to get around working remotely, work through the distracting proximity that my sofa/kitchen had to my new desk (blinkers became essential), and gradually come to understand the correct number of casual team meetings that we should have over Zoom (fewer is always better). Accepting your home as the place where you do everything (work, play, eat and sleep) came upon us so quickly that we barely had time to accept the idea ahead of it becoming the norm for the whole year.
Paired with the crushing frustrations that came from not being able to visit friends and family, pub and restaurants, the cinema and theatre, gigs and sporting events; the new normal became a frustrating blend of beige that felt like it would never end.
It wasn’t all bad, was it?
Not at all. The various lockdowns over the year have encouraged us to embrace many new things that I would like to see continue. From a work perspective we’ve discovered that there are processes that can be streamlined and modernised and should probably become the new way to handle things even after we return to the office. I’m similar appreciative of the need to recognise the importance of greater personal space in places such as shops and restaurants. I’m sure this will be quickly jettisoned once we return to something closer to our pre-pandemic lives, but I’m enjoying some of the sense of community that has arisen in the face of the challenges of Coronavirus.
I’ve enjoyed the moments of lockdown where we have, as a result of exhausting all other avenues of entertainment, embraced TV shows, films, and other interests that we would never have dreamed of considering. Most notably I remember how we all became obsessed with Michael Jordan, Scottie Pippen and Phil Jackson through the Netflix documentary The Last Dance about he Chicago Bulls.
You can count the amount of basketball matches I’ve watched in my life on one hand, but I was absolutely hooked on this series. So was the rest of the UK, and I remember having conversations about this show with people who would rather watch anything than something that involved any sporting activity.
Other activities took off throughout the lockdown. Baking reached even greater heights than it’s Mary Berry/Paul Hollywood GBBO heyday with people making banana bread in such huge numbers that almost every other post of my followers on Instagram seemed to feature their latest baked creation. Walking also became the escape that we needed during the lockdown. Parks and walking trails across Northern Ireland have seen such large increases in visitor figures from people desperate to escape their houses. Online exercise classes became part of the daily schedule for families across the country. This will undoubtedly reduce as we emerge from lockdown to something akin to normal, but I optimistically hope that this greater level of physical activity is embraced by the public in our post-coronavirus lives.
New lockdown, new me
We all thought lockdown would be the opportunity to improve ourselves. Take up a new skill; try that thing you have thought about doing for a while; try that shaved head that has been secretly stalking you for the past 5+ year (this one is weirdly specific and actually worked out quite well for me). We all now had the time to try to make ourselves better and maybe find our true calling.
This website was started way back at the beginning of the lockdown with this expectation in mind. If you look at the time between posts (and if I’m honest, the quality of the posts themselves) you’ll see that it hasn’t exactly worked out as I was hoping. Look…I’m giving it another go here and I hate to see it going to waste.
Other people have managed to make the lockdown work for them. Some have mastered instruments, improved their homes (as well as you can with infrequent deliveries and shops being closed) and others have turned their talents into viable businesses. This includes my sister who has started her own business using her interest in mixed media art.
I actually found my own artistic interest was piqued during lockdown when I discovered the pixel art of Johan Karlgren. I had dabbled in pixel art briefly before, but I truly embraced it when I discovered the things you could make with Hama Beads. Some of my creations are shown below. You could very easily say that I’ve shamefully copied or co-opted Johan and other pixel artists work and you would be correct. But, I would say that doing this art has genuinely been the most rewarding part of my lockdown experiences. I have dotted a few of these pieces around the house and also handed a few out as gifts over the Christmas period for friends and family.
I’m not naïve and thinking that this is going to be my long-term plan for my life, but do welcome being able to take this forward in my spare time moving forward.
Holidays also took a bit of a back step and a rethink throughout the lockdown. I had originally planned to go to Croatia in September last year and this obviously had to be cancelled in the wake of the various lockdowns across Europe. This meant thinking about a holiday that was closer to home and I eventually settled on a road trip to the south of Ireland. This took in Galway, the Ring of Kerry and Cork. I really enjoyable week was had driving around these absolutely beautiful parts of the country and it got me thinking about the other fantastic places available to us on our doorstep. I’m still hoping for the opportunity to get on a plane sometime this year (if it’s safe to do so), but it’s good to think about the alternatives if we have to wait a little bit longer.
So…you’re concentrating a lot more on the positives
Well…haven’t we all throughout this lockdown? We should never forget the often unimaginable difficulties that thousands of people across the UK, and millions across the world, have experienced throughout this coronavirus pandemic. We all know someone who has experienced a loss related to Covid, or gone through the worry of you or a loved one catching the virus. The resulting impact of necessary lockdowns has inevitably hit hard upon other unfortunate groups that have been caught in the wake of the virus impact: those who are unable to mourn family members and friends, people struggling to gain access to essential services, and the impact and uncertainty children/teenagers/students face around exams and being unable to go return to school/college/university.
As we enter a more hopeful phase of the coronavirus and lockdown pandemic with the rollout of vaccines for the population, we should never let politicians forget who was ultimately to blame for prolonging the impact of the pandemic in this country. The rush to exit lockdowns too soon, the botched delivery and provision of PPE for health workers, the constant cronyism and handing millions of pounds to their mates, and ramming through a Brexit deal throughout this time has already tried to be swept under the carpet whilst we are met with the good news of a prompt delivery of vaccines by the NHS. Never let these shower of c**ts forget what they put the country through.
Lockdown has been tough even for those of us who have managed to adapt well, and we all need to be prepared for the next phase of this pandemic. We really need to be compassionate and understanding as we face the reality of how we come out of lockdown in a safe and responsible manner. I’d love for things to go back to the way it was before, but that’s not really how it works. We need to come out slowly, keep following mask and other coronavirus requirements as best that we can, and realise that we’re all in this together. Life is not going to go back to normal straight away, and given the incompetence we’ve seen from those leading us we need to realise that there will be bumps along the way.
We’ve come this far together…we need to be stronger than ever now to make sure that we don’t follow the same mistakes we’ve already made throughout this year.