I’ve been contributing to this magazine for a while now, and I’ve never struggled with figuring out what to write. That is, until now. We’ve been in varying states of lockdown now for over four months, with each of us having vastly different experiences of this time. Because of this, I didn’t want to write a piece that looks at the lockdown experience as a one-size-fits-all set of statistics – we have the 6 o’clock news for that. Instead, I realised that during this time, for the first time in my life, I have kept a diary. In this diary I have documented all my feelings – the good, the bad, the self-indulgent – in a desperate attempt to be able to understand and quantify this period of heightened emotion and uncertainty. For this issue, aptly titled the Summertime Sadness issue, it felt necessary to share some excerpts from this diary. Perhaps this will inspire you to start your own diary, or perhaps we have had similar experiences and this article can help you feel less alone. I think there is a certain kind of magic in allowing yourself to be vulnerable, so this is me doing exactly that. Welcome to my diary.
March 27th:
Wow there are a lot of things that have changed since my last diary entry. In the last week I’ve been temporarily laid off from work and the country has been placed under lockdown because of the dangers of the virus. It feels weird to type that out – I’ve been adopting a probably unhealthy dose of ignorance since this started because the truth is scary, and I’d rather just not know it. On the flipside, I can feel my body is feeling stress even though I’ve been trying to not think about it, so I’m clearly failing and should start to entertain my feelings soon.
Other things to note: I no longer need a perm. Turns out having free time means I have been able to figure out what the diffuser extension for my hairdryer does and it is legendary. Also, I’ve learnt that walking for an hour only burns about a chocolate bar’s worth of calories. Fuming. I have been extra hungry recently and thought it was justifiable by the amount of calories I have been burning on my daily exercise. It is not. I am simply just eating more.
April 15th:
I’ve had a personal timeline of goals and achievements my whole life and now suddenly the world has halted my progress. I know I said I was a bit stressed at the start of the year and could do with a holiday, but I don’t think I ever asked for the world to stop quite so dramatically. Social media is really overwhelming right now so I’ve been trying to take as many breaks as possible from it, I just don’t understand why people are being so forceful about how we should be using this time to perfect a new skill or write a book. I’m constantly stressed, always mildly angry, and am prioritising making my sister watch all seven seasons of Brooklyn Nine Nine instead. That is the only thing on my list of lockdown goals, and it’s going quite well.
I’ve found another walk that is a bit more scenic than the one I have been doing the past couple of weeks. I tried to do the 5K run challenge on Instagram and have decided that that level of exercise is not at all for me, so I’m focusing my energy on finding long walks through the woods instead. The Bluebells are so bright at the moment! There is something so calming about being surrounded by such a vibrant flower. I’ve never really been an outside person, perhaps this is my awakening?
April 20th:
I’ve finished my 00’s themed quiz and I can’t wait to do it with my friends in a couple of days! I’m still not sure how I feel about all my interactions being on zoom – its so nice to be able to see the people I love and hear about their days, but the conversations always feel so unnatural. I guess when I’m hosting the quiz this won’t be a problem, but there is nothing I miss more than being in a big group of people with five conversations happening at once. Or when someone says something that another person doesn’t like, and you catch their eye roll out of the corner of your own. Lush.
I’m still very stressed and angry, but I’m getting to grips with the fact that these feelings probably aren’t going to leave me any time soon. I’m not very good at coping when I don’t have a plan in place, and the fact that the media industry is laying writers off every week makes me think that my future potentially won’t be as bright as I originally thought. When I feel like this, I’ve realised that the best way to push through to the other side is to have a bubble bath and listen to Dolly Parton. Also, I started a new book today, though, which has helped me take my mind off things. I’m all for the little wins at the moment.
April 25th:
I come undone to be put together differently.
I haven’t stopped thinking about this quote since I read it a few days ago in a magazine. I’ve always been scared of the thought of being undone - to me to be undone is to be open, or worse, broken. But being undone is simply taking a step back, going from a tied shoe to an untied shoe. It doesn’t mean the shoe is broken and can never be worn again, it simply means the shoe is fulfilling its purpose of being able to be worn more than once, or perhaps it means that the lace was tied too tight and needed adjusting. I’m not really sure how I got to thinking so deeply and entirely about what a shoelace represents, but it has made me realise that being undone is nothing to be afraid of. It’s part of our journey. And maybe, just maybe, once we are undone we can be put back together differently: a better person, a happier person, the human equivalent of a shoe that is neither tied too tight or too loose. Perfect.
May 22nd:
This last month has been SO rough for my emotions, but it’s also gone extremely quickly, so I guess you win some, you lose some. I can’t even tell you what I’ve done with this month, I think I have netflixed the weeks away. I can, however, tell you that today I saw my best friend for the first time in two months! We parked our cars next to each other and had a picnic with the windows open. It was weird, but so nice. I’m not sure I have the words to express how happy I am to have been able to have a normal conversation with someone I love. It felt like, for a couple of hours, nothing had changed.
May 26th:
I can’t wait to be so close to someone that I can smell their aftershave. Even if it’s that one that reminds you of P.E changing rooms because every boy doused himself with it at 14 years old. I don’t care, I want to smell it.
Super excited about being able to get my hair cut. The appointment I had just before lockdown was cancelled so I’ve been planning this change now for almost five months! It’s all I think about.
June 12th:
Tomorrow is my first day back at work after lockdown. I feel a lot of panic because the shop should not be opening, but it seems that the economy is more important than my feelings. I’m excited to feel a sense of purpose again – this time off was appreciated at first but I’m really not good at doing nothing for extended periods of time. It has made me feel empty. I’m scared, too, but that’s mainly because I don’t know what to expect. I don’t think that things will ever go back to how they were – which is good! – I just hope things are going to get better, whatever that means.
This was originally published in Boyfriend Magazine.
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