In this strange new world of ours, even the concept of being ‘out and about’ has been turned on its head. The seemingly rare opportunities to experience the little things of our old, ‘normal’ world are moments to be celebrated. ‘Normal’ seems like decades, rather than weeks ago to me.
Without further ado… a few little glimpses of normality afforded to me this week.
It’s a thing of beauty, joy and wonder, isn’t it? A fully stocked minced meat section at the supermarket. The date: Friday, March 20, 2020, the time: 1645.
I’m one of the lucky (depending on how you look at it) people who still gets to commute to my usual place of work each day. While everyone else is now au fait with Zoom and Pexip, I’ve only just added them to my phone because I’ve spent the day doing normal work things like take part in the great ‘remove or leave the staples before shredding’ debate that gripped our team last week. For the record, I always remove them. It would not be a good look if my staple was the one that broke the shredder everyone on the ward has to use on a daily basis. Not good at all.
Speaking of work. In this brave new world of ours, infection control has become a priority beyond the workplace. There’s growing concern about the possibility of bringing the virus home with us at the end of each day. One possible solution is for those of us who trot around in civilian clothes and shoes to switch to scrubs and washable shoes like Crocs. Never one to shy away from the opportunity to investment dress for any occasion, I’ve ordered these steel grey scrubs and some black Crocs, the appropriately named ‘On the Clock’ style.
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| via Crocs.com.au |
I might never return to civvies again if the scrubs and clogs are as comfy as they look.
Any opportunity to simply be outside and moving my body has been savoured.
No matter how mundane the vista, keeping my connection to the physical world around me is a privilege I’m using as much as I can as rumours of suburban lockdowns swirl in the press. Given
the way we’ve treated Bondi Beach in recent days, I’m not surprised more restrictive interventions are being considered. Will we ever take this seriously, I wonder?
The internet is pretty much our portal to the outside world when we’re not at work or school. Homework gets uploaded to SeeSaw by Master SSG while I furiously google everything (including how to use Pic Collage) to help in my laptop. God bless the NBN!
Authors, artists, actors and celebrities have reached out as their contribution to help make self isolation less traumatic for children (and their parents). Mo Willems has started a series of videos inviting fans to draw and chat with him at lunchtime. It’s just delightful.
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| via twitter |
Josh Gad, famous for his voice in ‘Frozen’ has begun reading stories via Twitter each night.
Art. books and the human voice. How humbling that it’s taken us a pandemic to truly appreciate these feats of human civilization.
The world is as full of pleasant surprises and silver linings these days. We just need to be still, breathe and seek them out.
Be well.
