Well, quarantine has been a mixed bag, I’m not gonna lie. Wednesday 25 started out really positive – the sun was shining again, I’d managed to set up some kind of half-way ergonomic work station near the sunny window, and my self-employed partner received a call from his long-term clients with the offer of a couple of days’ advertising work. He started hitting that hard (he’s a graphic designer and art director) with the kind of hyper-focus he’d described to me before but that I’d never been privy (subjected?!) to directly. Very quickly I saw the stress building and did my best to work in the same living room whilst keeping distractions to a minimum. At times it proved impossible as I sometimes have to make video calls to my clients, which are obviously confidential, meaning he had to move and work in the bedroom with the door closed.
That evening instead of watching the 5pm Prime Ministerial announcement, I decided to burn off some energy by going for a jog (I have literally never voluntarily jogged in my life). We are allowed out of the house once a day to exercise and/or to get ‘essentials’, so I messaged my friend who’s just started jogging to ask, like…how do you actually start to jog? Do you just leave the house and start…jogging? She suggested I download the Couch to 5K app. I did and it was brilliant; Sarah Millican is my ‘personal coach’ and the first run was so easy even I could do it and feel a sense of achievement. I ran 8 non-consecutive minutes! You are supposed to have one rest day before doing the same run again, but because of my suspected Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome and the need to ‘pace’ exercise, I listened to the little pain flare-up I had today and did some gentle stretching yoga instead (I’m not usually this insufferable, I promise).
Yesterday, Thursday 26, the shit hit the fan in our flat. I’m sure the shit is hitting many thousands of fans all over the country, but a whole range of minor irritations, major deadline stresses, table deliveries and underlying existential angst culminated in the kind of fight that I really thought was done and dusted a long time ago. I quickly double downed on the self-isolation and spent an evening in the bedroom, with the door closed. Thank god for Netflix, books and Deliveroo. Today we had to have a much earlier and clearer conversation about what happened yesterday, and I feel the extraordinary circumstances have allowed me to draw a line under it much faster than I usually would (what, me hold a grudge?!). I’m sad that during the 8pm UK-wide Clap for Carers (basically a massive cheer for the NHS), I was in too much of a malaise to join in, but I’m glad I took the time I needed to have a good cry and a sulk. It brought into focus the fact that I can’t just run home to my Mum and Dad – they’re in Australia and the window for flying back through middle eastern and asian countries has all but closed. That in itself brings about a lot of underlying anxiety. Thankfully my partner can see the sorrow that brings me and I think that allows him to move past things and give me a break.
So, that brings us to today, where I’ve had lot of time on my own to get work done. I may have demanded Jack sleep on the couch last night so he was largely asleep. There’s a sense that the work teams I’m part of have adapted to working remotely – emails have been sent around with new local protocols which is reassuring. An equilibrium has been restored and boundaries reestablished. One of the positives that may come out of this is: if you can survive lockdown together, you can survive anything together. Tonight I’m focusing on setting up my seed germination station. I’m going ghetto and using leftover plastic food containers under the radiator to germinate (see disinfecting stage below), and then eventually placing the trays under the fluorescent seed growing lights I’ve ordered online.
Figs Ahoy 