Some of My Thoughts on Covid-19, A Year On
Soooo, let’s just talk about this, shall we? I tried to keep it to a minimum on this site but considering how it’s such a major part of all our lives, it’s entirely too difficult to not talk about it either. From what I can remember (and a quick look through news articles), Singapore didn’t enter lockdown until sometime in April. But the fear of Covid19 (or coronavirus then) was well and alive in early February. As of 25 February 2020, we had clusters, the realisation that you can recover from Covid-19 with no external symptoms and panic buying from grocery stores in this part of the world. We had entered Dorscon level Orange (Dorscon is a way of categorising an outbreak or disease here. And I’m sure you can guess that orange is probably not that good). Everyone was agitated in some way.
A year on, masks, sanitising, and temperature taking is the new norm. We have already seen enough of people wearing masks incorrectly, the occasional non-mask wearer, and the lack of social distancing. We roll our eyes at them, huff with irritation or glare at them as they enter our personal space. “Shouldn’t they know the rules by now?!” We think to ourselves irritably. When I look back at the numbers and voracity of Covid-19 now, I don’t know how it wasn’t painfully obvious by February 2020 that many of our lives will come to standstill for quite some time. We still had hopes and dreams. Now, a year on, vaccines are being distributed, numbers are starting to come down in many parts of the world, and some parts of the world are already living “normal” lives. (By the way, am I the only one who finds articles titled “[country name] is already having concerts!” as such a poorly romanticised notion of what “normal” life is? Is that what you really care about? Concerts? Concerts are the pinnacle of normalcy?) Yet, many of us are kind of ambivalent or impassive. We are still struggling to find our footing, we have heard our fair share of “Oh my god! Do you know I nearly left the house today without my mask?” and are just …. uncomfortable for the most part with this “new norm”. Some of us have mentally tapped out, living in a “Just let me know when this is all behind us” bubble (perfectly understandable), some of us are trying to grasp at any promise of positivity and optimism, and some of us truly believe that better days are coming. Most of us are just taking it one day at a time, trying to hang in there and we oscillate between being positive and “realistic”.
The one thing I’ve felt truly blessed about is that I have been able to hold onto a job, pursue what feeds my soul and live a life that’s close enough to my 2019 life. I tell myself I shouldn’t be complaining but truthfully, it’s so hard on some days! Mostly because somehow, all the days feel kinda the same now – they blur into one. I get up, I shower, I eat, I settle in in front of a screen at work or home, I give work my all, I unwind, I eat dinner, I sleep. Repeat. Some days I wake up in a fit of rage with no clue why. Some days I wake up with my jaw clenched so hard. Some nights I jolt out of sleep because I was screaming in a nightmare I cannot recall for the life of me just now. I can’t even say I miss going on a holiday because I’ve shut that off completely. But, we are all living in a bubble where everyone is just as anxious as the next person. I tell myself it’s fine to blow off some steam, hello, this is a pandemic, you are allowed to be upset. But it’s just easy to talk myself down.
Having more time at hand with reduced vacations and lesser opportunities to simply be out makes me feel like I should have written the next best-selling novel and have the body of an Amazonian by now. And for the most part, I am someone who sets goals and chips away at them steadily. I decide whether I failed or succeeded in it at the end of the year. But for the first time, with no concrete goals to work towards, there’s this feeling of stagnancy. Even if I have one, like reading 3 books a month, it’s so easy for me to wonder what the point of it is or find it so inconsequential when looking at the bigger picture. Some days I’m all “Ain’t no pandemic tough enough, ain’t no mood lows here for meee” and I work. Some days I kind of just want to sleep and let the day wash over me. Then I realise I’m not built for naps or sleeping 24/7 so I just stay in bed. And binge Netflix without watching a single scene because let’s be honest, it’s not about what’s unfolding on screen, it’s just a placeholder for reality. By the way, if you’re like me and feel permanently disoriented like you’re on a ship or like you’re like living through a fog, apparently there’s a term for it. It’s called “lockdown fatigue”. Which is a thing now. Worrying about family and friends who are at higher risk, worrying about the general state of the world because of the pandemic and numerous civil unrests and unjust, feeling hopeless, and ALL the emotions current events are triggering in us can cause anxiety or leave us on high-alert mode. At ALL times. Which negatively impacts your sleep quality (refer to point about how I’m waking up with fear or rage). Which means you’re never fully rested and hence, feel tired, like you don’t have enough sleep, and just disoriented. And sure, all the articles tell you to take a deep breath, meditate or diffuse lavender oil to help but it just feels like feeding an elephant popcorn (It’s a Tamil saying that’s supposed to contrast a big problem with an ineffective, smaller solution. Like you know, you probably can feed an elephant popcorn but when are you going to be done? Will an elephant even feel full after eating popcorn? That kind of thing.) So, I mean, we can try meditating, we can try diffusing oils or burning incense. But is that really the solution?
Another thing is, we don’t have much of seasons here in Singapore. So the view out my window is usually the same. And of late, I’ve barely been away from this window to take a minute and appreciate the view because I’ve missed the comfort and consistency of it. We are either having a rainy moment or a sunny moment and even that is becoming less and less predictable with climate change. As far as I can remember, February to March was a solid rainy period. It was always cold, you need to keep an umbrella at hand, and it will rain non-stop for days sometimes. Until 2009 at the least. It’s 34 degree Celsius today. And has been for the past week. And was like this last year too. There was a bit of a rain spell yesterday, but it was so brief it did nothing to counteract the heat that I wondered if it had rained at all. Which only went to show me that nothing is given. Nothing stays permanent. Change is the only constant. Simple cliches that we all know. But I can’t help wondering about what if the change is not for the positive?
I’m reading more horoscopes and watching YouTube tarots way more than I usually do. Not because I believe in them, but because I need something positive to keep going. I would say they’re slightly more effective than my lavender oil. Even despite a pandemic, many of them have been able to find positive things to say. None of them predicted my January correctly. Or my February. Yet I watch them. It’s like a naïve obsession. And if that’s what’s going to keep me going, then that’s what it is. Because uncertainty about the future is more than ever before. I don’t know when the end of this is going to be, but I know not everything will return to “normal”. Maybe our lives will feature Zoom much more prominently? Maybe Zoom wedding attendances will be a new norm for people who just can’t fly down. Or maybe Zoom meetings will be the way to go so you can still think “This could have been an email.” I don’t know about you, but I’m using my phone less and less because I’ve developed a serious case of screen fatigue. So maybe that’s another change for the future? Either way, what I do know for sure is that this has to come to an end. All things come to an end. And if history has taught me anything, it’s that people find a way to bounce back, to be okay, and to find new ways to be happy and comfortable. That’s another thing I know for sure.
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