one
Probably one of the most surrealist weeks i’ve ever lived through which I imagine we won’t make full sense of until it’s faded into history. Things still only feel like they are getting started too. London is in ‘lockdown’, yet Victoria Park is packed with people who all seem to have just discovered running. Some people are having picnics. You would have to look pretty hard to know a global pandemic was on our doorstep.
two
I’ve really leaned in to the stay at home mindset at least. I find it somewhat ironic that I wrote a lot in January and February about how i’d become lazy and needed to get out the house more. And now i’m required to the exact opposite, indefinitely. But i’m somehow ok with it and hope that i’ll emerge at the other end with a renewed appreciation for basically everything.
three
Spent a good part of Sunday and Saturday assembling my 10 year travel history – one of the required things for a Canadian residency application. Through a combination of Swarm check-ins, emails, texts, Dropbox files, Instagrams, passport stamps, booking reservations, and just trying really really hard to remember, I was able to compete the task.
Doing this kind of digital archaeology on yourself really makes you reflect on all those trips and what they meant and I have a lot of feelings. All the decisions, friendships and relationships and circumstances which made them happen, and how most of them wouldn’t or couldn’t happen now, for better or worse.
I thank my old self for using Instagram / Swarm religiously, and Gmail search actually being pretty decent, this task would have been so much harder without these.
Also i’m so happy the Instagram aesthetic of the early 2010’s is dead. What were we thinking.
four
Spent a lot of time organising stuff in the flat now I know even more of my life will be spent here. Cleared out the spare room finally and set up a better place for the projector in the living room which I refer to as the media station when in fact it’s a travel ironing board balanced on two trestles, covered with a table cloth. But honestly it’s a work of art.
five
Work has been a bit of a blur. The company have been very supportive and overall feel very luck to have a job which is already optimised to operate remotely, and I already have a space at home to operate in – I know it’s been a much harder week for many others. Overall, minus the intensified dread and anxiety, my day to day hasn’t really changed much at all.
six
I’ve been experiencing multiple symptoms which all point towards the virus – dry cough, temperature, weird body aches. It’s Sunday now and these, mostly, seem to have faded, which is good.
seven
Watched Children of Men on Saturday. I swing between wanting to watch comfy films (made it 1/2 way through Always Be My Maybe before giving up), to the bleakest stuff I can think of. So far the bleak stuff is winning. Really enjoyed this explainer on foreground / background in the film, feels very relevant to now.
eight
At least we still have the internet.
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Photo: Couchsurfing in Japan, April 2016
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