My day started with Cosmic Yoga. The poses were familiar. The young British presenter in a pink troll costume with an energetic screech to her voice was not. This was followed by a quick course of Let’s Dance, hip-hopping around my lounge with Sophie. Meanwhile Ruby’s mastering the difference between kinetic and potential energy and sees no shame in attending her class zoom meet in an oversized pink fluffy Oodie and bed hair. Such is the way in Level 4 lockdown.
It began on Wednesday with news of a case in the community. In Fortress-NZ, just one case of this variant will not be tolerated. Before the Prime Minister hit our screens with her message of kindness, a type of madness had already hit our stores with supermarkets reporting snaking queues in the rain. Annoyingly I was genuinely running low on toilet paper and the fruit n veg store only sells rolls by the dozen. I did my best to hide the rolls behind bags of plentiful bananas and bright orange mandarins. By 6pm the rumours were swirling. Everyone knew someone who knew someone in the Police, hospitals or at the border. Everyone had the inside word. Our family managed to squeeze in a Covid jab for Pete, a ballet exam for Sophie, and a bottle of the finest gin I could find.
Ruby has a shopping list of the parties and school activities that she’ll miss this week. Pete’s ski trip is almost certainly off, and the rate things are going I’ll have to fundraise for Cancer by running my upcoming marathon in a repeat loop around my neighbourhood. It’s at times like this that we look further. Sydney’s outbreak cracked the 600-mark yesterday. I know nothing of the NSW premiere or her politics but can’t decide whether to feel hopelessly sorry for this woman in power or amused by her increased level of anger at her press conferences. She will be remembered for sure.
We look further still to Afghanistan. We started lockdown yesterday with compulsory family viewing of “He Named Me Malala”. There’d been lots of questions in our house this week about the Taliban and I wanted the girls to understand why people are hanging off planes to get out of Kabul. Instead of feeling sorry for what we’re missing we’ll be cheering on the Air Force Orion headed out from our local base. Destination Afghanistan. Hoping they’ll recue our allies who’ve helped the NZ Defence force, making sure they escape with their lives. We’re a team of 5 million locked down, plus a further 40 heroes headed to the Middle East this week. We could be in this for a while.
Sandcastles & Scribbles 