Empty streets. If you ever wanted loneliness, now is the time to walk.
What is there to update?
Well, despite the huge global pandemic, and the restriction on movement, and my extreme lapse in exercise, due to all the above factors, I still managed to lose an extra 2 kilograms.
So now, I am sitting steady at 73kg.
4kgs away from my goal.
It seems my dieting, whilst not as tight as before, is still working.
What isn’t working as well though, are my writing skills. They seem to have gotten a tad rusty, during my sojourn, and it is reflected in my struggle to put my thoughts together in this very rundown.
So I guess I will have to adopt, a rapid fire paragraph approach to all the issues that I think I’ve faced during this very long absence of posts.
I am still working.
Boredom is very much the name of the game here, at my workplace. With the shopping centre devoid, robbed and closed of any personality and people, I have taken to walking around the centre, indulging in a post apocalyptic fantasy. Eating alone in a shop, with no one in it, is definitely a strange callback to the vibes I felt when watching that Will Smith helmed I Am Legend.
COVID-19
I guess I always saw this coming. It was either going to be a zombie outbreak, which despite fiction and no basis in science, is genuine, irrational fear of mine, or a plague. I couldn’t see nuclear apocalypse happening, because even if it did, no preparation of mine could stop it.
But I did see plagues and zombies as a real fear because well … I could still be around when they strike. I remember thinking very early about vaccinations and wondering when viruses and bacteria got so good at beating man at their own game, that a supervirus would wipe out humanity. COVID-19’s delayed reaction, spread and diverse symptoms are a sign that viruses are getting better at beating us.
Plus the Earth got to restore some balance to itself. We’re certainly aren’t doing anything about ourselves to stop ourselves. We used to be one with nature, back in the days of the First Nation people. Now, our hubris, arrogance, and dominance has finally come to bite us in the arse.
One virus is all it takes to literally halt the endless “progress” mankind values so much. A sobering reminder of our mortality and puny nature.
Finance
I’m still working. Even though I don’t want to. I guess it’s a small blessing, when so many people are out of a job. I am still getting fortnightly payments and I guess I can start saving aggressively for things on my wish-list. I just wished work wasn’t so boring.
Weather
My favourite season is essentially here. With daylight saving over, and time genuinely being correct, I can start to unwind and relax in this cold and darker period of the year. Even though it’s freezing outside, and exercise shouldn’t be recommended, if I get enough gear, I can probably still maintain my running ability and skipping progress.
Hmm … guess it’s time to go Under Armour shopping.
It’s nice to know that the weather finally reflects how shitty of a year this has been, instead of mocking us indoor-bound creatures with perfect skies and clear water.
Daily routine
This is the moment of shame for me. Without work, both from Tofu Events and Miniso, it has been an endless cycle of these 5 games:
For Honor, Grand Theft Auto V, Call of Duty Modern Warfare, Insurgency Sandstorm and Animal Crossing.
And with eating in between all of those, youtube videos and little else.
I haven’t even read a book yet. Or raced cars in a simulator. In other words, practice actual skills.
Pretty damn depressing.
What a degenerate I’ve become. I guess that’s why I am writing this right now. To spark some creativity back into my system. My mind demands that I do something productive, create something of myself.
It’s always never ceases to amaze and disgust me, how much of a slob I become, when robbed of the feeling: purpose.
Atmosphere
It’s strange. Fear is rampant, and yet I also see happier families playing in the yard and more family time being spent. Of course there are the hilarious stories of people hating their spouse, because they actually have to spend time with them but for those who live for domesticity, it’s been interesting to see them blossom.
Then on the other side, you have people dying, hospital workers being stretched to their limits, retail workers getting abused for toilet paper and a lot of other stupid shit, that humans end up resorting to when finally faced with the idea of death.
Overall, I would say this COVID-19 is ultimately a good thing. It’s about damn time people woke up to themselves and what impact we can have on each other and the Earth. In a very cold, honest way, I can’t help but think this is a really good lesson to humanity. A lot of things are always more clear when seen through the lens of mortality.
I mean that in all honesty. All the small problems you have, suddenly look petty when compared to the idea of death or spreading death to people you love. We’ve finally stopped worshiping stupid stuff, like the importance of celebrity, whether the new Iphone will be better, whether you really need a HSP at 2am at night.
We can, finally, as a species, take a damn breather from the prison we’ve created for ourselves and actually appreciate the finer aspects of life.
But ultimately the reason why I say it’s good, is because the environment finally has a chance to recover from our destructive lifestyle. I was stunned by the images seen from Venice, where the waters were clear and dolphins had returned. Or the satellite imagery of pollution levels in Italy, after a week of people staying indoors.
How strange is it to think, that climate change progress has been accelerated by a huge margin, because everyone stays indoor and the world just slowed down. Less tourists, less business, less people out … I could only wish that in the future to help our planet, we would make a COVID-19 memory week where everything shut down.
I would also like to think that people think a bit more harshly on governments. Maybe all these disasters faced this year, shows people the importance of being kept abreast of politics. You can hate politics, and despise politicians, but you can never afford to be ignorant of politics.
After all, these people are the ones that dictate your lives in times of crises and if you vote and choose the wrong party, people lose their lives and stupid decisions get made like bringing in a passenger ship with 100 confirmed cases and letting them loose in a bustling metropolis.
I never understood people who chose to vote without thought or care. It is yours and everyone’s else lives at stake here.
Be informed with every decision. Even when it comes to ticking a box to a person’s name.
State of Mind
If I had to sum up my existence in the midst of this COVID-19 pandemic, I suppose I would say it like this:
Bored and lacking drive.
Which, if I am honest, is essentially the same before the whole pandemic started. So not much have changed.
I just got to make the most of what I have. Exercising outside, is not foreign to me. Nor is being indoors for days on end. Making little money at my store is also not much of a change, even when my shopping centre was full.
I don’t miss different food all that much, nor exploring the city.
I think the only inconvenience, is my inability to get a haircut. My hair is getting annoyingly long. Maybe it’s time to invest in an electric shaver.
These are weird times. Certainly not the end of the world, but I suspect when I look back on it, it was a time when the world stood still just for a tiny bit.
~Damocles
Damocles' Journal 