Post-Lockdown Anxieties
With infection rates slowing and vaccinations a-flowing, we are beginning to see glimmers of light at the end of the tunnel. The nearing conclusion of this time of suffering, grief and turmoil should, of course, bring about feelings of relief, hope and jubilation, but this is not what I am feeling.
It’s unsettling — this conflict between how I think I should be reacting, and how I actually am — and it’s something I’ve been reluctant to vocalise. I’m stuck in a tug of war between my longing for post-pandemic freedoms, and my anxieties for the future; but as the end of lockdown creeps closer, the latter grows stronger. It’s admittedly not the reaction I would’ve expected from myself, someone who previously relished the social and cultural richness of a metropolitan life, but I guess this past year has transformed us all in ways we’re yet to even discover.
It goes without saying that my experience of this pandemic has been mild — an entirely different picture to those who have been battling on the front line, or grieving the loss of a loved one. I have been fortunate in that, whilst outside my window the world has been working in overdrive, I have been adapting to a new reality of increased quiet, space and time. I did lose both of my jobs, and consequent income, but having opted for the life of a freelance artist, this absence of work wasn’t a total shock to my system. I’m lucky in that I’ve managed to stay on pretty even financial ground — thanks to living at home with my parents — but (as with most of us) have had to adapt to a new, particularly frugal lifestyle; and the lack of purpose and structure that my previous work provided has often made me feel utterly lost.
The word ‘normality’ continues to get tossed around, as something we cannot wait to resume when lockdown eases. For many people, this ‘normality’ promises a generous flow of work, beckoning business, returning to the office, sending their kids back to school, lavish meals out, and guilt-free spending of all of the money they’ve saved during lockdown. But I’m not sure what it implies for me? With the threads of my previous life life lying loose, my future is currently a blank canvas — my plans don’t extend much further than the end of the week.
Up to now, I’ve felt okay about the not knowing; the absence of work, and my slightly befuddled view of the future, have been excused by lockdown and its knock-on effects — and a shared reality for much of the population. There has been a collective understanding and empathy towards those who have lost their livelihoods or sense of direction, but I fear that, as much of society kicks back into action, such understanding will dissipate. With busy streets, an increased work-load, and uninhibited socialising creating a facade of ‘normality’, it will be easy to forget that the aftermath still remains, and it will be no quick clean-up.
I fear that those of us whose lives have come undone as a result of the pandemic will be left behind, whilst those able to push forward will do so at an escalated pace. With the nearing expiration dates of furlough and other governmental support schemes threatening to take away people’s only safety-net, a new bout of financial instability and chaos looms. The 1.69 million unemployed in the UK will have no choice but join the battle to find work, in a greatly depleted pool of opportunities, or take on jobs that divert them from the professional path they’ve worked so hard to carve out to this point. I’m fortunate in that I’ve been able to use this time to slowly build a new career for myself, but I worry that, when the torrent of financial pressure, external expectation and internal obligation comes rushing through, all that I have built will come crashing down.
On the phone to my friend, he confessed that he too feels a sense of trepidation whenever Boris announces that we’re getting closer to the lifting of lockdown. He explained to me that the life that beckons isn’t one he’s particularly content with — his week consumed almost entirely by shifts at the local pub simply so he can pay his rent, and little time to pursue the career in the performing arts that he is destined to.
Although he’s fully aware of how lucky he is to even have a job to go back to, this time in lockdown has only intensified and clarified his real aspirations, and with so much having changed over the course of this past year, going straight back to the pub feels a bit like a regression.
Lockdown, in many ways, has given us back our autonomy. Old routines have been written off, leaving space for new, healthier ones, that we’ve personally tailored to our needs. For some of us, our homes have become a microcosm of the outside world, where we’ve been able to craft and sculpt our days to be exactly how we want them (though that’s, at times, felt very limited); time has been ours for the spending, and the pace of life ours to determine.
I finally feel in sync with my days, after years of constantly chasing after them. I used to leave the house at 6:30 most mornings, with the contents of my whole life in my backpack, and not return until after midnight, having pin-balled across every corner of London to attend various work and social commitments. I ran solely on adrenaline and stress, with every minute of my time accounted for.
It’s taken a while, but I’ve managed to settle into this new groove. I’m enjoying not moving at a million miles-per-hour all the time and not feeling as if there’s always somewhere I should be, or something I should be doing. I’ve come to value and find pleasure in the simple acts of cooking dinner, going for a walk and meditating every morning — all things I didn’t have time to do before (or wasn’t willing to carve out time for) — and I don’t want to lose these things once the world starts to speed up again. But I am also craving the cultural richness, spontaneity and diversity that our lives have been stripped of. Things have become a little mundane and, when I think about it, I’m not sure I could endure the monotony of lockdown for too much longer. Life is calm and pleasant, but lacks real definition and colour.
Though I want to keep meditating, I also want to have beer spilt down me by a stranger at a live gig; though I want to keep walking, I also want to get back to bouldering in a sweaty, stinky climbing centre with my friends; though I want to keep cooking dinner, I could also do with eating a sloppy Brick Lane bagel at 3am. I’ve always endeavoured to milk the most out of life, but with the constraints of lockdown, I don’t quite feel I’m succeeding.
After nearly a year’s worth of social deprivation, there is a palpable, collective sense that we need to ‘make the most’ of our post-coronavirus freedom. We (understandably) feel that we need to catch up on lost time, and people are already putting plans in place for when restrictions lift. But having had a year of solitude, spent within a significantly shrunken social sphere, the idea of such intense socialising is a little intimidating.
There is an expectation for us to eagerly rush back to our social circles and say ‘yes’ to every invitation; for it to be a time of hedonism and celebration equivalent to New Year’s Eve or a birthday — when you’re meant to be having the best time all of the time. A widespread resurgence of FOMO is thus inevitable - with someone else’s depiction of a ‘good time’ always looking superior to your own.
Although I don’t suffer from social anxiety, I’ve savoured the lack of pressure around socialising. With the element of choice having been taken away, I’ve adapted to this new culture of walking with a friend. A solid two-hour walk-and-talk feels equally, if not more, fulfilling than lots of little, bitty, rushed social encounters like before; the emphasis has been on quality rather than quantity. This time spent one-on-one with friends has been an opportunity to strengthen and renew old relationships, and I worry that the end of lockdown will see these bonds fall slack again.
That being said, there are entire categories of friendships that have been temporarily erased from our lives as a result of the pandemic — people that aren’t close enough to quite warrant a two-hour walk — that I do really miss. Our friendships have been distilled down to the core “inner-circle”, which has only gone to highlight how valuable those outside of it are too — the other close friends, the ‘school-reunion’ friends, the people you only know on a first-name basis, co-workers, familiar faces at the gym, situational friends. The depth and intensity of these friendships may vary, but they all play an important part in the vibrancy of the human experience. I’ve definitely noticed and mourned their absence, and look forward to welcoming those people back into my life again.
With all of this in the mix, it’s no wonder that that the prospect of lockdown lifting doesn’t fill me with unadulterated joy. This time has facilitated a wealth of positive changes, that I’d be sad to see fade away. It’s shown me an alternative approach to living that I’d never thought possible, and has given me ample time to really invest in it.
The approach of a post-pandemic world brings up a load of uncomfortable questions with uncomfortable answers. It forces us to address the thoughts and concerns that we have happily demoted to the back of our minds until now — fundamental and monumental aspects of our lives that might look different now from how they looked before. We’ve had a whole year to reflect and recalibrate, and putting that all into practice when everything opens up again is quite a daunting prospect.
Though we are all pledging to continue with our new ways, I am sceptical. If our previous tastes of freedom were anything to go by, these changes will soon be forgotten, and we will quickly be swept up by the tsunami of modern-day pressures and habitual patterns.
But what I really hope we will cling onto is the increased sense of acceptance, understanding and self-government that is a by-product of this time. Maybe my apprehension about the end of lockdown is, in fact, an apprehension that this will disappear? I’m unsure of how my current circumstances and lifestyle will fit in a post-pandemic world, or how well I will reacclimatise, but if these attitudes continue into our next phase too, then I guess I needn’t worry.