Crawling along

Two hundred days of lockdown. Why and how did we land in this mess?

My mom has left – escaped I have to say! I imagine her life, at home, with my brother, peaceful and orderly, with very little happening and I feel angry. She has earned it I know, but there is still a part of me which feels upset that she didn’t do more or that she chose what is easier and convenient for her. I long to be where she is. Isn’t it a sign of defeat to want everything to end, to finish? To just look forward to the end of your productive life? Or is it normal when one is seemingly in the middle or a never ending cycle of everyday?  

Is anyone struggling as much in this lockdown as much as parents with young kids? I have been losing my temper more frequently since my mum has gone, which was bound to happen. I feel searing irritation with the kids, them bumming around, their stuff everywhere, being underfoot, pouncing on you constantly, not listening, not cooperating, wailing and shrieking. I have to bite back screams and dream about throwing things and yelling and just going away. Is it harder on them?  

There have been more battles – imaginary and real. My daughter’s two best friends in school have announced that they are moving on – one to a better school (the best in the city) and the other one’s family is relocating. It threw me when they announced it, the old familiar feeling, of being left behind, in the same mess, while too many people around you move on. I will miss the mothers, I worry and feel for my child, who will miss her friends. If you accept everything beyond your control placidly and calmly, one part of me thinks you are half dead already, when nothing is allowed to pierce through – where you allow nothing to make you feel upset and low. Or is me struggling more like a death rattle for our life?

My husband has been making strange plans about moving beyond what he is currently doing. I only wish him well, it is good if it works out, but also, where is this support and thought and plotting where our lives are concerned? Our home, our children’s wellbeing, my career, our happiness, is all chugging along as usual. We are apart again, though I moved on from one brief, nasty fight. Fighting is pointless and hard on the kids.

We have also been battling the flu – wretched, horribleness that it was. The lack of appetite, the exhaustion, my husband handled being sick as dramatically stupidly as only he can manage. We fought over whether we had Covid. My throat is still itchy and I wait to feel better, though the worse is now behind me.

The only good thing has been a reconnection with an old mom friend, allowing my child to meet someone and connect with some version of a normal life. One long beer filled afternoon chatting was most fun – the most fun I have had since March. And it has been a lighter week at work.

But otherwise, I want to withdraw from the world. There doesn’t seem too much of me left. Am close now to just begging that this ends, somehow, soon. So our outlets are available, the cups of coffee, the outings, school for the kids, escape from the here and now, escape from this little home.  

I remind myself that this forced staying in is allowing me so much more spare time than I would otherwise have had. There are thoughts about yoga, art, spring cleaning – the only thing I have managed to fit in are daytime naps. There is a sluggishness to everything especially in this sticky October heat which prevents anything from happening, even the air is leaden and grey.