The Year of Madness
This year has been a rollercoaster of extraordinary events. Wildfires in Australia, Locust Swarms in North America, a global pandemic; and of course, the dreaded lockdown that came with it.
In this post, I’m going to share with you all my experience of this year of madness, and hopefully share some insights into how I coped with all the news.
Spoiler: I stopped listening to it. Nobody needs all that negativity. Between Trumps Antics, the never-ending duels between Boris and the EU and the Pandemic that never seemed to go away; really the best thing was to tune in only sparingly.
Once a week is probably best. Or the madness starts to creep up on you, and before you know it, you’re pulling out your hair from it all!
But the Lockdown is the main culprit for all our struggles I’m sure.
2020’s Mental Lockdown
To begin with, it was a welcome thing, at least I thought so.
It was March 2020 and the Virus was starting to spread more and more rapidly. It was honestly a scary time just to be around other people, and I was a paranoid wreck: avoiding being in the same room as strangers and washing my hands at least 5 times a day. I remember being so relieved when the Lockdown came, and I didn’t have to worry about all that anymore.
April and May were written off, there was nothing to do out of the house, so I spent my time playing games inside, went for long walks in the glorious sunny weather… and drank far more than was probably healthy for me. It was really like one big holiday. Albeit a very strange one. The weather certainly helped to keep spirits up whilst I lived on the emotional rollercoaster.
It was a bizarre, surreal experience, but not always an unpleasant one. Hearing what was happening to others with working at home and dealing with kids (and worse, sadder things), I may have been in a minority. And I must admit, it got boring quickly, not being able to see my friends or family or go to the restaurants and pubs. Getting a Ben and Jerry’s Ice cream out of a vending machine during a walk felt like a rare and precious treat, and I really started to appreciate all the things I took for granted before all this Lockdown business.
The Not-Ending of the Lockdown
Then along came June. The Month that was supposed to be the beginning of the end for the never-ending lockdown. Until then it had been quite straight forward what you could or couldn’t do; and generally speaking, there were a lot more ‘couldn’t’ than ‘could’ until then.
Although I’d appreciated the Lockdown, after 2 full months of nothing I was ready for it to end. There were parts I would miss, but there were so many things I was looking forward to returning to for the first time in ages.
But naïve me, thinking the Lockdown ending would be as straightforward as it was when it was implemented, would be disappointed to find the thing just would not go away as planned. First, there was a timetable, most businesses would come back in June, entertainment and other ‘less-important’ businesses coming back in July. Simple. Well, no!! The arguments came, ‘less important’? what classes as important are different for everyone.
First, there was urming and erring, by politicians, health officials and the general public about what was and what was not safe to open, and if the lockdown even should be lifted at all. Then there were delays, and changes, and a million and one exceptions made for everything after the not-end of the lockdown.
Now it’s September, kids are going back to school; big sigh of relief, no more homeschooling. Things look like they might finally go back to normal; the new normal. I’m looking forward to seeing everyone’s happy eyes, looking at me over some amazingly designed masks. In our brand-new beautiful studio (which was a whole roller coast ride in itself)
So, with a lot of ups and downs what a thrilling ride that was, it will certainly stay with me forever. How was your year of madness? I can imagine most of you can relate to my story, I bet you are also looking forward to returning to the studio and starting to feel something like ‘normality’!
See you soon,
here is a little reminder of some of the amazing memories we have had at The Pilates Rooms during lockdown xx
