Yellow Azalea

25 March 2020

Who could have predicted that by mid-March 2020 the world would be in a state of chaos due to the Covid-19 Pandemic? Not me, that’s for sure.

I started this year with hope for a better one and made a booking for a trip to Italy and Greece in June/July with Holly. Italy has been on my bucket list forever, but both financially and with our family dynamics overseas travel has kind of been one of those things I used to do. With Holly’s passion for history and her studying Classics this year, it would have been the perfect mother and daughter trip. Anyway, we won’t be going now and that can’t be helped.

When I first heard about the Corona Virus in China, , as a typical Generation-Xer, I was a ambivalent at first. My “she’ll be right” kiwi attitude to the forefront, I never imagined the impact it would have on the world and just how devastating it would be when it hit Italy. At first, I thought we might be far enough out date wise to still travel, but with such a rapid spread, I have had to forget about the trip and focus on my loved ones. That’s my little bit of feeling sorry for myself over and now it is time to move on to what this post is really about.

TWO DAYS AGO NEW ZEALAND RAISED THE COVID-19 ALERT TO A LEVEL 3 AND BY MIDNIGHT WE WILL BE IN ALERT LEVEL 4.

A WEEK AGO THERE WAS NO SUCH THING AS ‘ALERT LEVELS’, BUT IN RESPONSE TO THE GROWING NUMBER OF PEOPLE INFECTED HERE IN NZ WE WILL BE IN “LOCKDOWN” FOR AT LEAST THE NEXT 4 WEEKS.

Everybody has their own disappointments to face as events and gatherings have been cancelled, and we have seen international travel reduced to a minimum. For our wider family, it has meant Mum moving in with Cyrilla (my sister-in-law’s Mum) and Rachel and Josh (Niece and husband), returning home from their 9 month long honeymoon. I recall having a discussion with Rachel sometime last year about how in her ‘lifetime’ as a Millenial there had not really been any amazing inventions – sure technology has been advancing but that their generation was not a part of seeing the car, electricity, phones etc invented. For all of our sakes, I hope that we will see a vaccine or cure for this – that could be a great invention.

Around here there has been panic buying of toilet paper, meat and all sorts of grocery items. But what has worried and affected us the most personally was the rush to get hand sanitiser and face masks. People who don’t normally buy these products were buying up large quantities to stockpile. As an ‘underbuyer’ personality this goes against my intentions. Our household is more likely to run out of toilet paper than the average home, as even after 16 years of being a family I still think we only need a 4 pack for the week. There are times when visitors have arrived and I am like – oops we just ran out of toilet paper, we have no coffee, you get it. Seriously, I buy groceries almost daily, and the whole concept of weekly shopping and bulk buying is an alien feeling. The one exception to my underbuying would have been wine. I never used to run out of wine. Never. Thankfully I gave that up 674 days ago or I would have needed to stockpile sooo much wine it would have probably filled up one half of the garage.

So what did this panic buying mean to me? Well, it meant when I dropped into the shop to pick up some hand sanitizer there was none on the shelf. I had to get some antibacterial soap and hope for the best. Today I thought I would be clever and start doing an online order. Then what do you know, you can’t get a delivery all week – they are all booked up. So, now, because of the craziness of the ‘other people’ I can’t get essentials. I know that I will not be the only one affected by this, but it makes me disappointed in humanity. Our PM has asked everyone to ‘shop normally’ yet there has been unprecedented panic, causing shortages of flour, bread, bananas, mince – name a food group, and there will be something missing.

Today, as I realised we were nearly out of coffee, mild hysteria and panic set in as I finally understood lockdown is going to be a month without a flat white. Why, oh why did I not think about this earlier – we could have bought a machine with the money I will save on flat whites.

Moving on from food, there is more to life than food, isn’t ther? There’s a lot to take in and I have had a lot to do with organising whether we can have carers for Mitchell or not. Today I have been finalising with our team of people who is willing to work We are able to keep caregivers coming as long as we provide protective gear. But it is risky. Right now, we have 3 regulars who are not going to work, and 2 regulars who will, plus 2 new casuals that are helping us out. We will also be doing Friday and Saturday nights ourselves for the next 4 weeks. Phil is working from home and Holly is having online lessons until April 8th, Mitch and me are trying to chill and we will probably be watching a bloody lot of the winky, wonkey donkey on You Tube. I’m already walking around singing Bob the Builder and Fire Truck, Fire Truck. Ah bless that boy and his repetition.

I’m going to finish up now, it’s almost 11.59 pm and our 4 week lockdown is about to begin. It’s going to be surreal living through this. But if we want to stay alive, then we must do this together, for ourselves and for each other.

Take care out there

Cherie xx