#112.20 - Sunday #26: Morning

Today's selfie

Yesterday's Nice Thing: Walking with Oisin on the Greenway

I did feel very lost yesterday. After almost a month of this. Time has stood still. I made many plans. Some I have done, others, mostly involving house cleaning, I have not. The worst thing we can do now is go food shopping. I resent so much the amount of control that takes place outside. I feel smothered. I have done nothing wrong and yet I feel like I'm being punished. We all have not, and we have been placed under lockdown.

And some people are enjoying the power. The police, for instance. Some have fallen back into the checkpoint days. How easily old habits resurface. Now with drones and ever more subtle monitoring, you can be check up on in your own house. In Singapore, us expected, everything is exaggerated. There have been not one, not two, but several racist incidents. Most Chinese Singaporeans being assholes. The disdain towards foreign workers is, as expected, disgraceful. I feel quite angry with everyone.

But I have made a few decisions:

1. I am no longer going to pay attention to the news.
2. I am no longer going to post on the virus - I have decided what it means to me and unless I see anything else that changes my mind, it is what it is.
3. I am going to be creative.
4. I am going to do ONE bit of cleaning a day and watch very little TV. To be honest, the TV watching has declined rapidly since the first week.
5. I am going to return to my plan.

I must really, to stay sane.

There have been a few victories. Gardening, painting, writing, website, etc. A few victories. Cleaning. But I have to make the most of the time. I have emerged on the other side and I am going to have those victories. We have another three weeks of this which means it will be reviewed at the start of May. In the meantime, I am going to make the most of what is left.

I was reading this blog post from a Bangledeshi worker who is under Covid lockdown. They really are so frightened about dying. I am not frightened of dying from the virus. I am frightened that the world I knew has suddenly vanished before my eyes. But we are now building a new world. And in this new world, we must take inspiration from where we find it. If we do not, then we will end up being coerced without even knowing that we have been pulled under.

I refuse to go under. Refuse. We must stand up for the world we want or we will be swept aside and swept away. It has never been more true than now. The future has arrived and I am part of it. I must be, there is no time to delay.

So I must write this down:

My one bit of cleaning will be the food cupboards which I had cleaned already but are a mess again. Not because of me.

I hate sharing the space with him, but I have no choice. He has no respect for boundaries or even efforts made to clean the place. This is probably the most exhausting thing there is.

My creativity will be piano playing, as usual, and doing half an hour of the song thrush. And now I will begin with my writing about Persephone. I find that I write in short bursts. I must write. I must. I have no choice. If I am to be a writer, I must write. I was reading about my Type in the Enneagram. I am a Type 4, no doubt. I read the other Types and I am a 4. And 4s despite having so many feelings must not pay attention to them, especially the negative ones AND they must have a schedule, which I have known about for sometime now. And they need to carry it out no matter what they feel like. We never feel ready - I never feel ready, but I must go ahead and do this. I must not wait for the 'mood to strike me' and I must 'always put myself in the way of good', and I must learn to 'not excessively ruminate or act on my negative feelings'. All good if I had listened to it years ago. But I am listening to it now. And something is better than nothing.