The quarantine diaries — Post script

Hello dear reader,

What an eventful and surreal fortnight quarantine was!

I left the hotel on Sunday. Compared to arrival — which was slow at every stage, from landing at the airport, to the bus, to the hotel — my departure was so quick it was almost anti-climactic.

It took only a few minutes between the police knocking on my hotel room door and freedom.

A kind friend picked me up and drove me home. I don’t mind admitting to physically jumping up and down once I was home. I threw open all of my apartment windows and doors and enjoyed a breeze and birdsong I won’t take for granted any time soon.

Once I had changed my sheets, unpacked my bags, done a load of washing, and unpacked my groceries, I was exhausted (at 4pm!). I managed to stay awake until after 8pm, though. Ha!

I haven’t been sleeping as soundly in my own bed as I had expected, but I suppose that may take time.

Yesterday (Monday), I returned to my workplace for the first time in five months. Between COVID and mum’s illness, I had been working from home for all of that time. It’s been lovely to see my colleagues in person again, although in a changed world — and my own world has changed forever, too.

Here are some random lessons I’ve learned from quarantine:

1. Expect the unexpected, such as the fact that your hotel room key will work once, then never again.
2. Prepare to be positive — Doing my best to see the positives in an otherwise stressful situation made a huge difference to my quaranatine experience. I definitely wasn’t Pollyanna all the time, and I had some dark moments, but knowing that I decide my attitude helped immensely.
3. Noise cancelling headphones are a gift. If you’re at all sensitive to noise, or just need peace and quiet, they’re amazing.
4. The only way out is through, whether it’s 14-day quarantine, or grief. 14 days felt slow, then fast, then slow again…Grief will not pass that quickly, but I will go through it. I can’t go over it or around it.
5. Be gentle with yourself, especially when you’re going through something stressful.

Thanks for reading my quarantine diary.

I’ll be back again soon with my random thoughts on other subjects…and I have many!

‘See’ you soon.