Since Covid-19 hit two years ago, I have blogged only twice about it, both times in April 2020. The first was about venturing out to the shops for the first time under the first lockdown/rahui confining us to our homes and environs. The second one lamented a return to the noisy business of ‘normality’ pre-figured by the chugga-chug-chug of a tractor mower across the river from where I live.
I had wanted to document the whole COVID experience more fully, for myself and others, knowing we were in an historical period. For years, I have kept notebooks of thoughts, experiences, poetical words & phrases, and important things to remember, very erratically and unsystematically, and have hardly ever given myself time to process them properly.
Now, two years on, with Omicron in full swing through the country - leading to our highest ever daily tally today; and an illegal occupation of Parliament grounds entering its third week, I feel it’s time to pull together some of my disparate ‘COVID thoughts’.
So, over the next few weeks, as we go through the two year anniversaries of significant milestones, I’ll be reviewing personally and publically, some of my jottings and memories of the last two years, mixed with the now. Hoping to make better sense of it all for myself, if not for others.
I want to start with my (and perhaps its our collective) basic fear in this ongoing crisis. For me, one of my key memories in the early days of the virus, possibly before lockdown, when things were in a real swirl of uncertainty over whether the virus was here, how you might get it, what kind of precautions to take; I realised, what we’re really afraid of is our own death (however it may come), and (at least for myself) the death or destruction of societal structures around me, even though I disagree with many of those structures and want them changed. The feared collapse of our systems was seen not just in the mad rush on toilet paper, but in the much more realistic rush on seeds and seedlings for growing your own food. I didn’t join the rush on plants (we do have a modest but erratically tended veggie garden), but I certainly felt the truly wise and resilient were those who could grow their own food.
At that stage, the virus had invaded our minds more than our bodies. Though I backed the government’s stance, I did feel we were being told what to think (about the potential threat of the virus, its possible impact, and how best to deal with it). We had to trust the medical experts, the health administrators, the government - and (unlike some on the streets today) I do consider we live in a basically healthy democracy and a healthy and diverse media who will (between them) reveal if anything is seriously wrong or corrupt in government.
I felt the resentment at being ‘told what to do’, even if I thought it was indeed the best thing to do. I didn’t like the sometimes disproportionate fear that was being instilled, made worse by extended media coverage, which still focuses disproportionately on the impact of COVID-19 and associated safety measures on developed countries and on ‘business’.
COVID is a real global crisis. It has been deadly and debilitating for many, and has highlighted weaknesses in our globalised world and long supply chains; but there are deeper, longer-lasting and more problematic threats to human health and well-being, such as environmental degradation and social inequality, which have now become intermixed with the pandemic impact and response. (My first blog of 2020 on 20 March touched on climate change, and made no mention of COVID).
But I and many others have still not learnt our lessons from COVID I feel - we were not made to dominate this earth in the way we have. In my 14 April 2020 blog, I quoted from Julio Vincent Gambuto, who warned us we could not spend our way back to ‘normal’. He advised:
take a deep breath, ignore the deafening noise, and think deeply about what you want to put back into your life. This is our chance to define a new version of normal, a rare and truly sacred (yes, sacred) opportunity to … only bring back what works for us, what makes our lives richer, what makes our kids happier, what makes us truly proud.
Money is only a means of exchange - a means to allot a numerical ‘value’ to tangible and intangible things.
What is essential to life is the Earth we collectively share, and what it produces. What is essential to thrive as humans, is our love, compassion, forbearance and patience with each other. It’s a long haul, and a big ask at times, but I’m grateful for those who try.
*By the way, the NZ Doctor has a good basic timeline of how COVID unfolded in New Zealand , primarily through case numbers. On this day (20 February), six New Zealanders from the infamous Diamond Princess cruise ship entered quarantine in New Zealand, while four were admitted to hospital in Japan with the virus. The previous day, 157 people evacuated to New Zealand from Wuhan earlier in the month were discharged from quarantine.