Writing from the UK here, where we are almost at the end of our three week lockdown period. I think we all fully expect that to be extended for a good long while yet, with the most optimistic predictions I’ve read saying these lockdown measures can be loosened by the end of May, almost two more months left to wait at the very least.
So far I’ve spent the time trawling Netflix (yes including Tiger King, how are any of those people real?! I’m currently writing this post with Michael Winners’ racist fever dream Death Wish 3 in the background) keeping caught up on my varied podcast feed and playing a frankly unhealthy amount of Football Manager 2020. If I’ve achieved nothing else during quarantine I want it known that I got my Darlington side promoted at the first time of asking, and presently looking a good bet to do it two straight years in a row (4-3-3 Gegenpress with wingers and one striker, if you’re curious).
I’ve been working out fairly regularly, thanks to workouts posted from the gym as well as suggested ones from friends and over the wide web as a whole. Also been running to get myself a good dose of fresh air, luckily where I live I have easy access to access land and fells so I can run without the danger of bumping into many or any people really. Plus I’m still entering the Great North Run in September, which to the best of my knowledge is still going ahead so I need to keep miles in my legs.
Fuck though it’s hard, having my world shrink down to the same four walls. I’m starting to grow sick and tired of the relentless messages of positivity and productivity that I see online during this period. Yes enforced social isolation is necessary but its also OK to absolutely hate it. In times like this you really grow to appreciate the small pleasures in life, for me the big one of course is going to the gym. Fuck I miss going so much, I miss the joy of a really good session on the weights, I miss the classes and I miss the amazing fitness community that’s been cultivated there. I’m also frustrated, purely for selfish reasons of course but at the time I’m still very much job seeking. This pandemic will extend that period of time for probably another 2 or 3 months. It grates a little that this has hit at a time when I have been enjoying a little more success in hearing back from employers.
But what has heartened me during this time is seeing some of the best of humanity. Communities coming together to look out for the most vulnerable, people coming out to support our amazing frontline workers. I do hope that once this has blown over, we can look out for those who kept society running as they looked out for us. I hope we can demand every single staff member working in the NHS gets the pay rise they so deserve (as well as the service is funded and resourced properly). I hope supermarket workers, public transport workers, the ‘little’ people in society whose labour has proven to be vital. I hope that our care for the vulnerable lasts long beyond the end of the crisis, that we can relearn what it means to work as a community. That the mentality of individual uber alles can finally be put to an end and we as a society realise that what we can achieve when we all work together and look out for each other is so much greater than what can do as atomised individuals.
Once this is all over though, I cannot wait to get out and see all the faces I’ve missed and will continue to miss, as well as to enjoy being part of a bustling community once again. The day where I lift a big deadlift or sink a pint in good company cannot come a day too soon. But for the forseeable, if you can then stay the fuck home!
Anthformation 