I’m writing this blog post during the month of May in the year 2020. For the first half of this year we’ve watched as a coronavirus has quickly swept the entire globe, bringing with it a disease called COVID-19. At the start of the year many of us assumed that this would be no worse than the common flu: those with existing health problems or weakened immune systems might be at risk, but most people would just have the sniffles for a bit and recover. I admit, back in early February I thought the same. Yet as it turned it was much worse than any flu. Firstly, it was much more like pneumonia than flu, with many suffering from breathing difficulties, high fevers, organ failure, and with a higher mortality rate than the flu. Secondly, it was easy to spread, partly because an infected person could be showing no symptoms for up to a week, while still potentially infecting everyone they came into contact with.

I first heard of the coronavirus in January, around the time I was flying home from a trip interstate. It had spread throughout a city in China called Wuhan, and soon the entire city was under quarantine. By February it was spreading quickly through other countries, including Australia. As the number of cases seemed to increase exponentially, and with it the number of deaths related to the coronavirus, the world began to change in ways no one had expected. Popular festivals and events like Coachella, Glastonbury, Wimbledon and even the Tokyo Olympics were cancelled or postponed. Whole countries like Italy and Spain began closing off their borders and locking down so that people couldn’t leave their residences except for essential reasons.

By March here in Australia not only were the country’s borders closed to international travel, but so were the state borders to domestic travelers: something that had never happened before in my lifetime. Whole businesses were closed down while others transitioned to working from home, restaurants and cafes could only provide takeaway services, all public gatherings including concerts and the like were cancelled, and people were asked not to leave their homes unless it was for basic necessities or medical reasons. Terms like “social distancing” and “flattening the curve” become commonplace. The world was looking a lot different now, and a lot scarier.

I won’t go into everything that happened due to this pandemic: that’s for the history books. I will say this has had two major effects: fear of a potentially fatal virus that spreads quickly and easily, with no known way to stop it other than avoiding contact as much as possible, but also a major economic impact due to loss of businesses and mass unemployment that looks set to dwarf even the Great Depression in scale. I must admit I believe isolation and quarantine measures have been necessary and have probably saved lives and minimised long-term economic damage compared to if the coronavirus were allowed to run rampant in the community (especially compared to countries like the US, UK and Brazil where the response was mishandled and the number of deaths numbered in tens of thousands), yet I still fear the uncertainty of a post-pandemic world. Let’s face it: what we had before wasn’t good, and an event like this might be the kick up the arse we need to change it. Whether that change is for the better of society or the further benefit of the rich and powerful remains to be seen. I still have some hope that something better will come. Looking at major pandemics in the past, there were several changes that made things better that we take for granted now. The Black Death, for all its devastation and tragedy, helped end the exploitative systems of feudalism and serfdom in most of western Europe, and helped bring about the practice of paid labour, something I’m sure we’re all grateful for today. That’s just one example: whether this pandemic will lead to a rethinking of our current systems into one that supports the majority, I cannot say, but I hope it will.

One thing I had hoped would come from this situation is, ironically, a greater sense of community and support for one another. I say ironically as we’ve all been asked to isolate from one another, but in doing so we still can remain in contact through that wonderful invention, the Internet. I felt that if ever there was a time for social media to actually prove itself as having any sort of value in making us feel connected, now was the time. I have to say, however, that the results have been mixed, at least to me. On one hand, certain bad actors are using social media to sow discord and chaos through misinformation campaigns and the like, particularly on Facebook and Twitter. It’s disappointing, and risking people’s lives, but sadly not surprising. On the other hand, there have been valid attempts by others to reach out to one another and support one another. The music community in particular has been a good example: many artists have been unable to tour or promote their work due to the pandemic, and have used Instagram Live and Twitch to reach out to the community, putting out online performances and the like to keep everyone’s spirits up (big props to Sofi Tukker and their daily DJ sets, now up to Day 71 as of this writing).

For myself, I must admit that the isolation from the coronavirus has had little change on my lifestyle. I was lonely before all this occurred, and as much as I hoped this crisis would bring friends and communities together, that hasn’t been my personal experience. Reaching out to others means nothing if they don’t reach back, and I feel that this event has shown me that there’s very few people I can rely on. That said, I’ve found a certain amount of inclusiveness in a few communities on Twitch, both in the gaming and electronic music channels. I’m not sure if any of those will translate into genuine friendships, or if I won’t screw everything up and be ostracised from those communities at some point, but so far they’ve been a bright point in an otherwise isolated existence. Perhaps, in a way, it’s a blessing: I see people on social media who are getting desperate that they can’t visit their five million friends, and yet for me being isolated is just another day. Either way, if there are any changes to my social life after this has passed, it’ll probably be further disillusionment.

At this time in Australia they’re starting ease some restrictions on gatherings and businesses. State borders and the like remain closed, and the risk of a second wave of infections is still a concern, but for now it feels like a certain amount of normality can return. Two of my passions, live music and travel, have been severely hit by the pandemic and subsequent lockdowns, and I can’t see either returning to normal in the near future. If all goes well and there isn’t a second wave of infections, then perhaps this will be an opportunity for more local travel: I haven’t seen a lot of my home state despite living here for 40 years, so perhaps this will be the time to do so. If what I’m hearing about international travel not really being viable until 2023 (except for, possibly, New Zealand) is correct, then domestic travel will probably be the only viable option for adventuring for a while. Good thing there’s plenty to see in Australia. As for live music, I feel that will take longer to make a comeback, especially large scale music festivals. I still have my VIP tickets for Splendour in the Grass in October, but I feel that several factors (health risks, border restrictions, lower turnout, etc) make such an event going ahead this year less likely. They may reshape it into a smaller, Australian artists only festival for this year like Falls Festival have done, but we’ll have to wait and see.

Mental health has been another factor in this period: like I said before, some people have been coping with this better than others, and a combination of fear of the unknown, isolation and future uncertainty have had their toll. Watching YouTube, Netflix and playing through the entirety of The Witcher 3, a game I’ve owned for four years but only just got around to playing, has probably helped keep my mind from becoming consumed by despair, and having my cat, Connor, around does help alleviate some of the loneliness. I must admit that darker thoughts and dreams have come up from time to time: dreams where I’m back at school (where most of my nightmares are set), bullied, humiliated and abused by all those around me, to the point where I decide to end it all. Perhaps I never did recover from those days, and perhaps I’m more scared of what I might experience in a post-pandemic world if shortages and desperation lead to greater exploitation by the cruel and powerful, and less room for kindness and empathy. I’ve found it hard to belong in the world as it has been; I don’t know if I could exist at all in a world like that.

I’ve also noticed that while in isolation I’ve been revisited by bad memories from over the years. This was quite bad for me a few years ago, when I was at my lowest: almost every day I’d be reminded of some incident in the past where I’d been hurt, or embarrassed, or hadn’t reacted in a good way to something that happened. These memories, stretching from recently to all the way back to my childhood, would feel like someone sticking hot skewers into my head, and I’d sometimes have to shout and swear to try and stop them from playing over and over in my head, with each replay being considerably worse than they probably were at the time. Then, when one memory was dealt with, there were always many others to take its place. For a time I managed to put those thoughts behind me and try to accept myself as I am and not dwell on the past, but whether because of the isolation or just an increasing disillusionment in general, I’m finding myself haunted by these bad memories again.

I started this post intending it to be something of a time capsule of what happened during this pandemic, and it ended up being about my observations and own state of being at this present time. I’m not sure how my thoughts will look to someone in the future: needlessly pessimistic or naively optimistic? Perhaps I’m assuming too much in thinking that these words will exist for people to read even a few years from now. All in all, I think the 2020s will be very different to the decades that have gone before. Whether that’ll be for better or worse remains to be seen.