I didn’t want to mention the ‘L’ word but here we are, back in another national lockdown here in England.
But this time, it feels very different.
It doesn’t ‘look’ like a lockdown when I gaze out my living room window. A steady flow of traffic is still chugging along, and people continue to wander the streets with their cute ‘lil doggies. Then there’s the kids clad in their navy uniforms, spilling out of the school nearby. It’s just the empty buses whirring past that act as a stark reminder that people are, in the most part, staying at home.
Back in the spring, it was incredibly unnerving as I could go out for a walk and see next to no cars or people at all. It was like a post-apocalyptic movie set. And when I did encounter another human, I’d instantly swerve to the edge of the pavement, or even cross the road completely – partly out of consideration, partly out of selfishness.
But if my walk last weekend, traipsing through the heaps of fallen leaves in beautiful Jesmond Dene was anything to go by, people’s attitudes appear to have changed with the season. They’re no longer precious about their personal space while outdoors, and the empathetic glances are gone. The weary silence has been replaced by laughter and normal chatter again.
Despite the alarming daily figures and scientific predictions, the fear is fading and I feel like I’m adapting to this ‘new normal’, as it’s been coined.
With that new familiarity comes a feeling of reassurance that things aren’t as scary and overwhelming as they first seemed back in March. I don’t think twice about wearing my dotty face mask or dropping my hand sanitiser into my handbag anymore. But when something becomes familiar, it soon becomes comforting, and that’s not always a good thing.
I think we’re all guilty of becoming stuck with whatever feels ‘comfy’, whether it’s in relation to work, family life or relationships. That’s why we end up sticking with a job that gives us the Sunday night dread, or cling on to a partner we fell out of love with many months or years ago. We’d rather hold onto something that’s familiar and ‘safe’ but ultimately wrong for us, than embrace the possibility of change and the abyss of the unknown.
Better the devil you know.
And that’s the problem with this pandemic – it’s forced us into adopting so many changes all at once, and none of it has been on our terms. It’s inhibited our lives in so many ways, but it’s also allowed us to focus on all the ‘comfy’ stuff that we were used to, and were unknowingly distracting ourselves from.
At times, I think it’s this lack of control and the unraveling of our day-to-day lives that’s been far scarier than the threat of the virus itself.
I’d like to think though, that some of the big cultural shifts we’ve seen will remain after the pandemic.
On a deeper level, I hope that the more nuanced changes to how we now think and behave will encourage us all to be truer to ourselves, and help us achieve what we actually want in life…as we’ve certainly had more than enough time to reflect and try to figure all our sh*t out!
Change can be daunting, but sometimes it’s necessary - whether we choose to instigate it or not.
November 3 - 9 mixtape
Quote of the week
Someone shared this quote from Bill Murray on their Instagram stories this week, and I happened to really like it, so here it is for your reading pleasure too:
Series of the week
The Undoing is a newbie to Sky Atlantic starring Nicole Kidman, Hugh Grant and Donald Sutherland. Set in New York, it’s a psychological thriller based on the novel You Should Have Known by Jean Hanff Korelitz, and it’s been brought to the small screen by David E. Kelley, who Kidman also worked with on Big Little Lies. I’ve only seen two episodes so far, but the jarring plot has got me hooked already - think a web of privilege, secrets, and murder. Oh, and the allure of Hugh Grant’s unmistakable British charm.