A Year Like No Other – My feelings towards living in lockdown

My morning routine normally goes something like this: exercise, shower and breakfast. Maybe listen to the radio. Then I would head out to wherever I was going to be spending the day. But since multiple places seemingly closed at once, followed by the imposing of the lockdown, the routine now stops with the radio. Now I have unlimited amount of time to do things, but they have to be within the house or local area.

I feel I have a clear understanding of the situation – it’s either stay near your home or risk contracting this virus. Under the circumstances, I would have to say that I am taking this quite well. I try to take daily walks with my dad, and I still manage to get the foods and medicines that I need.

I don’t feel that affected by all the cafés, restaurants and shops being closed. But with the cinemas closed, with myself being a film critic, this seems to be the only downside that I can think of. I’m also prone to coming across articles that predict doom for cinemas. But I would rather side with those that value the cinema experience, and try to remain as optimistic as possible. Worst case scenario – cinemas have a hard time restarting, but eventually find their footing again.

I think another reason for me finding it so easy to remain calm at a time like this could be that despite the limitations I have found ways to keep myself busy while indoors. I have written a lot of media-related articles (like this one) and all of them received favourable responses. I have also learned some things that I previously didn’t know such as some names of plants we see on our walks. I have walked 45 miles and I under- took an Open University course to develop my writing that was meant to last eight weeks, I finished it in four days. But then again I did find it very easy.

Good luck with your new ‘normal’ – however you may be handling it better or worse than others, and I know if you’re like me you are getting tired of hearing about it every two minutes. But even though it may seem like nothing more than unrealistic expectations, there will be a day where we can start to put this behind us and things will get better.

By Andrew Moodie