The A-Z blogging challenge is quite straightforward, blog everyday in April, except Sundays, with subjects that follow the alphabet. It’s all a bit of fun. My subject is ‘A month in lock down’.
I’m not normally someone who stays at home. My work takes me all over the region and I am always on the go, with one scheme or another. Being kept at home therefore is a wrench for me and the main problem that I am faced with is boredom.
For the first few days I really struggled, indeed I still suffer from time to time, but now I have a coping strategy. The problem is not that I don’t have anything to do, in fact I have an awful lot to do. The things to do fall into three categories: things I want to do but I can’t, things I want to do and I can, things I don’t want to do but can.
The first category is the one that gets me down. I can’t visit my grand daughter or my daughters. I can speak to them by video but it’s not the same. I also can’t do some of the jobs around the house as I can’t get the stuff I need, I can’t go shopping or go to a cafe. These I can rule out as they are impossible.
The second category is easy and I won’t dwell on them, while the third category is ennui itself. There are plenty of little things to fix, draws to tidy up, paperwork to be put away and old computer files to archive or even deleted.
My coping strategy is to set myself some objectives for the month. Between these I focus on moving from the second task type to the third and back again. I switch as soon as I get bored.
As for my objectives for the month: Build a wall in the garden (I bought the stuff before the lockdown); spend a day learning Dutch; finish my model of a church and; watch The Ring Cycle on DVD. That should be enough.
Stay safe.
Thoughts from a Guerrilla Worker 