Hiatus

Wherever you are.

I trust that you are well, and adjusting to your new abode, or whatever it is called where you are now.

This is just a quick note to let you know about a few things. I am not sure if you actually want to know what is happening here or are just glad to be out of the place. Also, I am not really sure how communications work, what medium to use and whatnot. But here goes.

Firstly, I love you. Secondly, I miss you more than I can ever say. Life without you, just plain sucks. Thirdly, I am sorry.

The sorry part. I am so exceedingly sorry that I have not held your funeral as you requested or scattered your ashes, that our business has lost revenue, and that I haven’t been able to be there to comfort the children and kidlets. 

Since you were here last, only weeks ago, the world has gone bonkers. I am not sure you would even recognise it as planet earth inhabited by humans. There are more wildlife out and about, than humans. A bit of a boon for the environment. I’m not so sure for the humans.

There has been a run on dunny paper like you would never believe. People have been hoarding it, even coming to fisticuffs in supermarket aisles. No dunny paper available for purchase for weeks on end. Who would have thought that when the world as we know it, was coming to an end, dunny paper would be so important? Obviously, folks don’t know about lambs ears, that lovely soft leafy plant we used in Lorinna in our hippie days.

Did you know that people apparently love pasta, and rice, and beans? If you are lucky enough to buy them, they are rationed. Just like out of a cold war movie. People have also developed a fondness for baked goods – their own. You can’t buy flour or sugar for love or money. Well, perhaps on the black market you could.

(But remember those shares we bought in Coles and Woolies? Rocking!)

Liberty – a word we never thought about when you were alive a few short weeks ago, except when reading about revolutions – is gone! Restrictions, measures, lockdowns, shutdowns, permits, exemptions are our words now. You cannot leave your house, unless you need to, but you shouldn’t need to, so you must stay at home, unless of course you need to leave. Lists of prescribed and essential activities abound. The Decree of the Covid Commandments stirs the blood of the politicians, but not the people.

Most unfortunately, what is most essential to me, the pollies do not agree.

There are so many things we are not allowed to do now, I can’t even remember them all. You can be fined big dollars for going for a drive in your car, even alone. Leaving your house to save your sanity is a very bad thing. Even if you don’t see another person, or disembark from your car. Learner drivers can’t practice driving, even with someone they live with. You cannot sit in a park, even to breastfeed a hungry babe or eat your lunch. These are also very bad things. National parks, state parks, city parks, beaches are closed. The outdoors and nature and open spaces are not allowed. No, no, no. Most definitely not allowed. Nature and fresh air are very bad things. Even though they are very good. You can’t be in open spaces with no else around you, or be in a car alone (unless you are allowed of course), but you can go to a busy supermarket, Bunnings, or a polling booth. With people, lots of people. Indoors.

Restaurants, cafes, gyms, schools, shops, churches, workplaces are all closed. But of course the bottle shops are open. We must have our grog after all.

Hang on, I forgot. Schools are open for those who can go, but closed for those who can’t go. Teachers have to stay at home, but go to school, or go to school and not stay at home. It all depends, just on what, I am not sure. 

The kidlets are doing lessons from home, unless they are at school. Lessons whilst standing on your head is a boon, as is extra free time. Screen time restrictions have taken a beating, along with the mamas’ sanity. But birthday parties without friends are not much fun.

And ScoMo tried to make churches workplaces over Easter, as workplaces can be opened if they can’t be closed. But I think that was canned.

Dentists, vets, specialists are all mostly closed. You can’t get your teeth attended to or have an annual skin cancer check-up, but you can buy a spade. Priorities.

Personal grooming is high on the agenda, so you can have a haircut. But only a short haircut, or perhaps a long one. We must look our best in iso (that is short for isolation; we are all too weary of the word to allow a full complement of letters). Particularly when people never wear anything but pyjamas now. See what a trendsetter I was?

Technology has become our saviour. Zoom is now everyone’s new best friend. Who would have thought that, when we had our first zoom business meeting years ago? Everything is now done over zoom, birthday parties, weddings, dinners.

You will laugh. Working from home, what we have done for twenty-three years, is now the norm! Commuting and traffic jams are a thing of the past. Today, we have slow internet speeds and frozen screens because of all the traffic on the super highway. Workers, not used to working alone, have zoom meetings to book another zoom meeting for the meeting they are going to have, to talk about the meeting they will have.

We can, however, go for a walk, if it is local. And we do not stop. You can’t drive to walk, that is just not on. Some other countries, they cannot even do that. Walk, that is. And yes, the whole world has gone peculiar. Not just Australia.

People – they are most definitely off the agenda. No people, no contact. Unless via technology, or the phone. Contactless contact, our new virtual reality. Another new term for you – social distancing (I wonder who first coined that phrase, combining two opposite words that became a law to keep people apart? I wonder if they are lonely or proud?). No hugs, no touchy feelies. Unless you live with a person, or tackle them in an NRL game. Mullumbimbyites are doing it tough. If you do see another person, you must measure the distance between you, with a tape measure or a kangaroo, whichever one you have to hand. If one person inadvertently moves closer, you have to advertently move further away. Strangers are allowed, but not people you know. If you do see someone you know, you can only see one or two of them outside your household at any one time. In your house. Or their house. But not the park, I think then it is only one. But I am not sure. The rules may have changed.

Depending on which state you live in, of course. Or which week it is. Or day. Except for Easter, when nothing was allowed, except the Easter Bunny in New Zealand.

Most certainly not fun, for a person newly grieving the loss of a most loved life partner (that’s you, by the way, just in case you have forgotten), whose household now consists of one. My first birthday without you. Alone. My first Easter holiday without you. Alone. 

Ah yes, we come to the first sorry. We could not hold your funeral like you planned, as our world was shutting down overnight. People could not travel, people could not gather. Only ten people at a funeral. So we made a judgement call – a Farewell Service at the crematorium, facetime and live streaming our companions in mourning. Two days later we held a virtual Moment in the Garden over zoom, so people could share their memories of you. Of course, people said really cool stuff about you. You were well loved and respected, that is for sure.  

This was super tough on everyone, particularly family. But your dear Mum, she just rocked along with it all. By the way, she is a tough little cookie, hanging in there, although her sweet mother’s heart is broken. She still dances in the kitchen by herself when a happy song comes on the radio.

We are waiting, seemingly forever, for travel to recommence, gatherings to be allowed, to hold your Celebration of Life. I often feel we made the wrong decision. Collective mourning left undone, rites and rituals unobserved and seemingly abandoned, lingering on in limbo. The book read, but not yet closed and lovingly returned to the bookshelf. The pages collecting dust, unwittingly turned by the vagaries of the wind. See how poetic I have become, since you left? I wrote those words – pretty cool, hey?

Remember how we loved to travel? Memory being the operative word. Borders are now closed, state and national. We are all separated, the children and kidlets, and I. My second and fourth sorrys. Movement is severely restricted, curtailed. Unless you are an NRL player, or a rich business person, then you have special rights that no one else has. The power balance hasn’t altered.

So there goes the scattering of your ashes, all eighteen locations you identified. For the now.

Ah, remember our dislike of cruise ships? They are not so popular right now. And the travelling folk who found freedom on the open roads or other lands? They have been doing it tough. Ordered to go home, many have no home to return to.

Remember the good old days of police states? Well, we are having a little flashback to our convict heritage. The police pull drivers over to check travel compliance, move people on in public places. They have discretionary powers to interpret laws rushed in without due process. What fun, when a police person rules what can and cannot be done, according to their own construct.

People are missing people, even the introverts. People are fearing people, even the kind-hearted. Neighbours dob in neighbours, even the friendly. The world has become a crazy place.

You know how the government has been itching for technology to track citizens? Well, now we have an tracing app. All in the name of public health. Dutton’s department was given first dibs to develop it, then their blunder was realised, so it was shafted to another minister. We will be allowed out, if we consent to being traced.

You would be so sad to see all the people who have lost their jobs and incomes, businesses. All gone. Overnight. The economy has been sideswiped, rear-ended, struck head-on. I managed to complete most of the project before we had to shut down, but we took a hit. My third sorry. After you worked so hard, when you were so unwell, to get the project up and running.

Where did these draconian measures arise from, this extreme authoritarianism? Have we suddenly become a communist state? Overrun by aliens? From a wee little virus, which spread and spread and spread, around the globe. A bit of a downside of globalisation and international travel.

You know those tests that diagnosed your cancer? How treatment started straight away? And the thirteen months of extra life that treatment gave you (not counting the last two, as they were rather shite)? Well, I feel sorry for any person now in a similar situation. Most of those procedures have been shut down. It scares me to think how many people will suffer from undiagnosed ‘standard’ diseases. Curtailing the virus has been the total focus.

That nasty little bugger, coronavirus covid-19, which has a bad habit of knocking out the older folk. But your Mum and my Dad are OK. Just in case you were worried.

The pollies are all rather chuffed with themselves, for avoiding a catastrophe. Well, I think it was the people who did that – so many people are hurting right now, who are doing it tough. They are ones paying the price for keeping everyone as safe as could be. There are so many stories. Sad stories, hard stories. Untold suffering. It would break your heart.

The lockdown – we’re not meant to call it that, apparently we are not locked down, even though we are in lockdown (even our words are dictated to us now) – is costing our country $4billion a week. Of course, the social cost hasn’t been identified. A bit too tricky, that one. It’s going to be a tough climb out of this.

But you should see the memes, the videos, so hilarious and creative. They knock one’s socks off, induce the peeing of one’s knickers. Families dancing together, music from balconies, haunting songs flowing over dark and empty streets, even bagpipers piping the rubbish bins out (that last one made me cry). It would make your heart sing.

Well, I hope you get this letter, but I have my doubts. Australia Post isn’t quite up to speed at the moment, what with everyone buying up goodies online, out of boredom or desperation. Those that still have jobs, that is. 

The world isn’t as you left it, six short weeks ago. I don’t think you would recognise it. But our house that we created, is just the same. Empty, but just the same.

All my love from me to you,

Your darling wife