Diary Entries

‘Freedom’ The birds fly free With joyous swoops Diving to fish On the glassy lake En masses they came The wild ducks today The swans and pelicans too No social distancing To hold them at bay Alas, we humans In this Covid time Held captive are we In home detention Our freedom gone To mingle and play In fearful obedience To our invisible jailor The freedom we took So much for granted Now longed for Like never before

My name is Archer Hopwood I am 13 years old. I live in the hunter valley in a place called Wallarobba It is 15 minutes away from Dungog, that is the closest town. Wallarrobba is just an area. I go to school in Maitland which is 45 minutes away and the school is called All Saints college Maitland. I live on a farm and during COVID- 19 It was the best I had 300 acres But I still had to do my school work, unfortunately, but during school holiday’s I didn’t so I was outside most of the day. On my farm, we run cattle and we had just come out of a serve drought, at least we didn’t have COVID-19 and a drought because that would have been horrendous. The weather at the moment is near perfect, looking out of my window from my desk I can see the hills with a morning due and the sun shining and I have to be inside when I could be riding my horse and doing jobs around the house. I love homeschooling because I don’t have to travel anywhere and when I have a break I can go outside and I don’t have to pack food and that I can go to the pantry and have all of the options also homeschooling I find it a lot easier and I finish earlier because I work on my own and I don’t have to wait for annoying students so I can then go outside. I am not like normal kids I don’t have any gaming consoles or anything.

There is no greater feeling than lying awake in a winter bed. The covers protect me from the cold air that fills my room. Normally, I would have to force myself out of bed, stroll to the coffee machine and await my fate for the day. Today, like the past several weeks, I have been given the gift of time. The COVID-19 pandemic has forced the nation into self-isolation, and with that a forced sense of boredom. I have been keeping myself busy. Exploring the depth of the internet, the pile of clothes in the corner of my room and the patience of my siblings. But it is on cold mornings like today, that I stay in bed much longer than I should. Is it weird I gain so much comfort from this place? The confines of my bedroom covers act as safety from the cold morning air. I lay awake, eyes closed thinking of when I should move. Thinking that if I count down from ten I will be able to face the wrath of the outside world. Yet I stay, for what seems like minutes and becomes hours on end. I stay in the depths of the covers, imagining all the possible things I could have done today, but did not. There is no greater feeling that lying awake in a winter bed, until the moment comes when you step out from under the blanket that protects and into the unknown of the day. One step and the feeling is gone. But there is another that comes with this, one that is far greater than a winter bed.

I write for a living. I am a journalist, and a creative writer, and a library assistant, and even if I weren't those things, I'd still be writing here. Some days I cannot get out of bed. I twist and turn between 'it's a global pandemic' and 'why can't you be productive?' until the sky is dark again. As I sat by my window last night looking for meteors (and finding none), I wondered what would happen to all the people after this. There is a Great Depression coming, the economists say, but there is also a great depression and loneliness and anxiety seeping into the space where people used to walk and work and live. Today, in the light, I wonder what we will look like when we have finished reshaping and reshuffling into a new normal, a new state of being. I write for a living, but sometimes I cannot write about this.

To Amara Well little girl, you’re not so little any more. Soon you’ll be 14, though already knee-deep in what preoccupies young girls these days. And I hope those are fun times for it’s not fun being anyone in 2020, especially teenagers. With luck in 2030, you won’t remember missing your grandparents. You will have forgotten video calls to your cousins (no substitute for their warm embrace). Nor will you remember being denied playgrounds and kiddie rides in malls. But you knew something was up. You told us the “comorravirus” could land us in “hostipal”. You reminded us to wash our hands and use “hanitiser”. I should’ve made hanitiser a trademark and sold it to a loaded pharmaceutical. Last Friday though was a welcome break from dreadful enforced isolation. It was the first time 2 adults and their children could pay a social visit to anyone for a month! This week we plan another get-together for Mother’s Day. We have the first shift hosting my parents on Saturday, and then shift them to Pepe’s to celebrate our wonderful mothers apart. But, it’s better than nothing. We adapt. But you know what is great right now? Little traffic. Cleaner air. Clear, starry nights. May kindness to the planet continue into the future. Work-wise, it’s tricky. I’m still FT but Mum’s hours are reduced. But above all, we’re missing getting together with the greater family, both here and overseas. For now we’re stuck in our little bubble, safe in isolation. Things could be worse. So we’re thankful we live where we live, that we’re healthy and happy together. For the record, we didn’t hoard toilet paper nor flour, or tissues. May happy and carefree be each step you take, baby girl. Con amor, tu mamá y tu papá!

I was due to travel to India and Turkey in March 2020 with my husband. By February, before the virus was first reported in Australia we were still ready to go since we were travelling independently and thought we would be safe, it seemed that it spread more in groups. I kept my eye on Worldometer with no reporting of the virus at our destinations. I checked the Singapore Airport website, where we would be transiting, it was reassuring about the cleaning regime there. However, gradually the news reports became unnerving. Temperature checks were being performed at airports. I thought, what if we just have a temperature due to a cold, would they stop us from travelling further? Will we need to be constantly taking paracetamol to disguise minor temperatures? Then I began thinking, will we need to wear gloves all the time? Masks? They were warning us that the virus remained on the gloves and mask so you had to remove them with care! It was all becoming too much. Finally my son's workplace was the first city office to be sent home to work due to a possible contact. What if we caught it from him and were taken ill overseas? It was such a RELIEF making the decision 10 days before departure to cancel the trip regardless of the financial loss. As luck had it we would have departed the day BEFORE the travel ban was enforced. So many Australian travellers were caught overseas as borders closed and curfews enforced. I felt so blessed to be safe at home as the horror of the epidemic unfolded so tragically overseas.

This morning.. My husband hunched over the table from another sleepless night, I make him another coffee. He is leaving for work, I wake up to face another day of filling the void. This pandemic hasn't been kind. We argue over what I am going to do today, will it be productive? Will I take it easy? Will I find the solution for what we are supposed to do from here? I get upset. He gets frustrated. He leaves. I cry.

Life in Lockdown Caught in a bubble, Virus aloft. Dunking our teabags, Oh, whoops, I coughed! Logon remotely, Switch on your mic. Vectors we all are, Postcodes alike. Download the Zoom app, Save in the Cloud, Email those clients, PJ’s allowed. Queuing at Woollies, Goop up your hands, Wipe down the trolley, Squeeze past the jams. Boredom is boundless, Each day a drag. Hang out that washing! Don’t be a nag! Netflix works wonders, Rubbishy shows. Brainwaves are slowing, Nobody knows. Finish that novel, Set up a blog, Work in your garden, Shampoo the dog. Race for a vaccine, Scientists sweat, Global pandemic, Not quite there yet! Sore throats are scary, Pass me the Vicks, Should I get tested? Not doin’ it for kicks. All of the workers On the frontline, You are the bravest, You’ve got the spine. What a vocation What a great gift, We are indebted, Shift after shift. Summer of bushfires, Fresh in our minds, Rebuilding thwarted, Payments declined. Flora and fauna, Habitat gone, Gene pools receding, Flash floods and storms. What of the homeless? How do they fare? How can we help them? Why don’t more care? Then there’s the women, Caught in a trap. Husbands that kill them, Why do they snap? Sometimes I’m lonely, Tired of the screen. Scrolling through Facebook, Sadness unseen. Call up a neighbour, Go for a walk, Do someone’s shopping, Just have a talk. When your world’s spinning, Out of control, Take back your power, Reach for your goals. Let’s make compassion, Open our hearts, Nation to nation, Each play their part. One day we’ll look back, Memories retained, Some things we gave up, Oh, what we gained.

The most crazy thing about this experience is the lack of TOILET PAPER. Why toilet paper? I mean, it is a luxury and a good thing to have. But with this fuss, it sometimes seems like the world ends without it. "Social distancing" is pretty crazy too. You hear stories on the news of police punishing people who don't follow social distancing guidelines. The penalties for not social distancing can get as bad as a 16,800 dollar fine or up to 6 months imprisonment. The media coverage on COVID-19 is INSANE. Every night you turn on the news, that's all it has. Every time someone dies in Australia, you hear about it on all the news shows. It's pretty crazy. If one good thing has come from this, everything is being cleaned, and I think that people will become more aware of the spreading of germs in general. It will be a long time though before things go back to normal. There is a start though, and that is people will be doing a staggered return to school and work.

Stayed up too late. too late 2 late tutu late for what? Late later latest thing is non-fiction how many people are infected how many people are out of work how many people are dying health economy the healtheconomy health vs economy life and death. and even the fiction is dark dystopia dystopian times death. environmental destruction. zombies. terrorism. pandemic. but/and there's still music. and on the tree outside a banksia cone is opening up so slowly I can't see it happening but tomorrow it will be golden.