Corona Diaries - The Beginning
18.03.2020
Well here we are, finding ourselves in the middle of an unprecedented quarantine period not even three months into 2020. It’s such a strange situation and it seems like everyone’s coping with it in different ways. Some people are pulling together: like the theatre makers and musicians who are creating online content while some are behaving disgustingly, like the groups going door to door offering to assist old people with their shopping and instead stealing their wallets and scarpering. Many are doing okay financially, their businesses are allowing them to work from home or they already were doing, some have lost their jobs with no clear plan of how to pay for rent, food or utilities and still more are out there risking their health on the front lines of healthcare, politics and so on each day. I’m okay pretty much. I left my job on February 2nd with the intention of studying for six months, doing just a little work from home on the side. For me, not a huge amount has changed in that sense, although my studying has been disrupted a little of course and the opportunity while work-free to get out and grasp opportunities has fizzled. This does mean that our finances rest on the shoulders of my husband which, seeing that he works in theatre and every show he’s working on globally has closed, is not as comfortable a situation as it once was. For now though we’re fine and I appreciate that a lot of people are not so where we can help others we intend to do so.
Currently though it’s the mental health aspect of the situation that we’re struggling with a bit. My husband is used to working and being mostly out of the house. Since he had what I think is flu we’re being cautious and self-isolating for 14 days (I’m still doing safe dog walks) so we’re together at home almost 24/7. A lot of that is lovely! We just got married and were complaining about hardly spending any time together since then so this enforced time together has its perks. After years of having a partner who worked almost every single night I now have a dinner companion, someone to watch films with (albeit from a safe distance) and time to talk about the future without having to condense the conversation into a brief chat. Not that we’re entirely sure what the future is anymore.
It’s this uncertainty that we, and many others, are struggling with. It makes it hard to know what to concentrate on, what the most important actions to take are and how to cope with putting our own frustrations and disappointments into perspective. This combination of cabin fever, work anxiety and concern for our friends and family’s health makes it difficult to keep your head straight. I’ve heard from friends, grown adults, hiding from their children so they can cry, others who thrive on social interaction and can’t handle two weeks working alone at home, more who are stocking up on alcohol and gazing sadly at their unpayable bills. Most of us are expected to be absolutely fine. That’s a relief but the palpable fears in the air, the major changes in societal behaviour right now, mean that it’s not a given and many are at risk. We’re both fairly anxious people and I have OCD. This potentially means that we trust ourselves even less not to overreact and if we relax we feel that we’re underreacting. We’re used to others reassuring us that everything is okay but no one is doing that right now. We want to see our family but we don’t want to inadvertently spread germs. We want to help our neighbours but we also want to self-isolate. We veer between turning our thoughts off with mindless TV and obsessing over messages from our friend who is an emergency doctor. My right hand in particular is raw from being washed. That in itself seems cause for concern, why is it faring less well than my left hand? Is the left dirty still?
For now the best course of action is to be sensible yet cautious. To look out for our loved ones and our neighbours and to reach for the silver lining in this situation. Right now that means I’m appreciating the daily walk with my dog more than I used to, I’m now more than academically aware of how important so many jobs in society are - the bin men, the doctors, the supermarket staff, the nurses, the taxi drivers, the carers, the delivery drivers, the pharmacists - and I’ve finally realised the true worth of my husband’s wine collection.