A week after corona 12 things you probably recognize

We are a week further. Not a week after corona, but a week after we stopped laughing it off, after we no longer see elbow greeters as whiners but retrospectively as seers, visionaries. We have survived this together. Time to take stock, in other words: the first week in 12 thoughts.

1. How loving we are to each other
Suddenly everyone is honest. About life, about disappointing incomes, or the total loss of income. I see families around me sitting together on benches in the front yard. Games are being played, puzzles of a thousand pieces are being laid on evenings when you would otherwise have been binge-watching. We cherish the comma instead of immediately zapping to the next chapter.

2. But how long will that last?
A woman snaps at me and friend L during our daily running round that we ‘need to keep our children apart’. We look back. Those children are cycling behind each other, so the desired distance is being maintained. Moreover, we are family. I find her anger a bit exaggerated but I understand her, because...

3. It is also damn difficult to maintain that distance
My sister-in-law has come up with the brilliant idea to all wave in front of my father-in-law's nursing home. We will strive for a Pausian balcony scene where he waves and throws kisses and we look up at him with a flag and shout ‘hang in there’. I want to hug her, my brother-in-law, my nieces, and teenage nephew but I have to hold back. Keeping my seven-year-old girl away from the back and shoulders of her cousin and nieces is almost impossible. I hear myself shouting like a police officer.

4. My daughters use words they had never heard a week earlier.
When I say that the mother of classmate T really has a very cool and important job, my seven-year-old girl says: ‘Oh, really? Does she have a primary profession?’

5. I am tidying up cupboards and apparently I am not the only one
On the news, I see that people find a trip to the bulky waste an outing and I understand that. Tidying up and sorting like with like, even your trash, creates order in your house and in your head. In a world where we have a grip on something, that is the only thing you have.

6. I keep thinking about what I would have done differently
You look at your agenda full of holes. Otherwise, you would have sprinted from lunch with this to dinner with that and tomorrow I would have celebrated that the Bijenkorf has existed for 150 years. I would probably have dreaded it beforehand (because Monday evening: arranging a babysitter, hassle) and would have ultimately left as one of the last. It seems so naive that we thought for years we knew what we were going to do in the coming months and a miracle that it often happened that way.

7. I think about terrible things
Suppose something terrible happens to my father-in-law during this period. Then we cannot be there for him, cannot play Mahler for him, and we would not be able to arrange his farewell as he wishes. Of course, that is not going to happen, but I think about it.

8. You receive so many lovely messages
We want to know how each other is doing, blowing love and support to each other via the app, helping each other not to go bankrupt. I empathize with the riding school because all those costs, how can they keep their heads above water without income?

9. You really cherish the moment
A week ago I was still in the ‘what are we going to do next’ mode, now I am fully in the now. If I can run with friend L, I seize the minute. Maybe there will be a lockdown, then that won't be possible anymore. We chat and cherish.

10. April 6 is not an end
So many promises have already been added that I really don't believe it will be different this time. First, the schools were kept open, now my babysitter can't even come. We now have a semi-lockdown, but I found the words of our king prophetic. Something about challenges that only get bigger (read: lockdown) and another hint that it is far from over.

11. I wonder how we will look later
If the hairdresser, nail salon, and gym remain closed...

12. I have started a book
Where I normally only have time to read during the holidays, I have now started ‘Finnish Days’ by Herman Koch. I am slowing down, that is something corona has achieved.

Strength to you. We are at least trying to provide entertainment.

Image: Lidian van Megen