I am sorry. Sincerely. Let me start with that. I know that not many people come here, but if you somehow got here and started reading, I will immediately give you a big spoiler. This is not going to be a compact and brave story about togetherness and optimism. This is born from rage. Pure and undiluted. Here I dump my frustrations, after all, this is my own back room, the room in which I write. Even if my baseline nowadays is "severely confused".
This will almost become a book in itself if this pandemic continues. If you don't feel like a gloomy story, go do something fun outside and feel free to walk away. I really can't blame you. As of today, I also reserve the right to walk away if people have nothing uplifting to report.
In cold times numbers are going up again, stricter rules are being contemplated and imposed once again...summertime means seeing your friends under certain conditions if we are lucky.
I am reaching breaking point. My patience has run out. I want my life back, and I mean the one I had, bastards... I can get mad, but what's the use, try reasoning with a bug.
The day I started to write this endless rant was just a shitty day. That there was a loss (the story does not tell if it is corona-related, it has not been widely tested in that carehome) in my family, that I have a daughter in a place where it all goes downhill even harder then over here, and I'd just spent an hour talking to a friend who was going through a truly hard time due to a wrecking and merciless disease, where I had to maintain social distance without being able to give her any real support or even as much as a shoulder to lean on, didn't really help either.
It is many months later now...
My friend died and I miss her terribly. I don't sleep enough, push myself from day to day.
I am just tired most of the days.
I keep reminding myself most of us here are better off than those who don't have their fridges full, don't live in a comfortable house, don't have a medical facility available nearby, and are not sure where the rest of their friends and family are. As if they would protest against wearing a mask, they wish they had one. Or a blanket. Or a toilet...
And the other thing I keep telling myself is that this is most likely about to pass in the end. Andrà tutto bene, given time. But it will just take so much longer than our patience can handle. For me it's mainly dissapointment, I always had this idea that the fabric of our society was made of stronger material then now shows. My mistake. And I suppose I should fight this feeling of selfpity much harder. I am certainly not a victim in this one. I'm just angry, stroppy and anxious. I guess we will all see each other in a different light in the future, more real, but not necessarily very charming.
Who knows.
On March 1 2020, I had the first of a series of pitch black days. I was probably not alone in this one. Many of those days would follow.
While people around me roared in my ear I should not panic and should go on with normal life, "just follow the guidelines neatly!", I really just wanted to stand still. Not the virus scared me, but the overpowering realization that we were on the threshold of a very bizarre time. From that day on in my head I got no further than; "Shit. Here we go. Down the rabbit hole ..."
I just got back from Italy, I know that sounds weird now, but when I left my home there really was "nothing wrong", no negative traveladvice, as was the case for many people who were abroad when it all derailed. I stayed 500 kilometers from the virus explosion. In any case, I had still seen what happened were I was staying. The schools had closed. The hospitality industry closed down. Museums closed. In the entire country. Guidelines on basic hygiene appeared on buses. People kept their distance, many all of a sudden wore face masks, and the streets became emptier every day. People who are exactly the same as us live in Italy. No other kind. No more fragile, no less clean. How is it that we in the Netherlands thought that we would react physically different to such a virus? That the virus would stop at a border? That it asks for your ID? Borders have never been less efective or more meaningless than now. And yet they all got more or less closed up. We had never been this unfree since I was born.
Anyway, the Netherlands held up business as usual from the end of February. That was best for everyone, reportedly. Keep calm and carry on with your work and just keep running like hamsters in a wheel. It seems I am a good hamster. I went to work. "Wash your hands and do not touch anyone". I followed every guideline. And the next. And the one after that.
I just got back from Italy, I know that sounds weird now, but when I left my home there really was "nothing wrong", no negative traveladvice, as was the case for many people who were abroad when it all derailed. I stayed 500 kilometers from the virus explosion. In any case, I had still seen what happened were I was staying. The schools had closed. The hospitality industry closed down. Museums closed. In the entire country. Guidelines on basic hygiene appeared on buses. People kept their distance, many all of a sudden wore face masks, and the streets became emptier every day. People who are exactly the same as us live in Italy. No other kind. No more fragile, no less clean. How is it that we in the Netherlands thought that we would react physically different to such a virus? That the virus would stop at a border? That it asks for your ID? Borders have never been less efective or more meaningless than now. And yet they all got more or less closed up. We had never been this unfree since I was born.
Anyway, the Netherlands held up business as usual from the end of February. That was best for everyone, reportedly. Keep calm and carry on with your work and just keep running like hamsters in a wheel. It seems I am a good hamster. I went to work. "Wash your hands and do not touch anyone". I followed every guideline. And the next. And the one after that.
I was slightly disgusted with myself, it felt unnatural to be so obedient. But I am rational enough to yield to simple reason. And whatever people think they know, I do not think this virus is not real or no serious business.
We kept the school open for two more weeks. March 15 2020 we were told that the school had to be closed down. In a so called "intelligent lockdown" I just continued to work from home and offered a lot of stuff and information that nobody used. I felt pretty non-essential. And while I kept looking for ways to keep in touch with my pupils and the world from my house, everyone went outside. Lines of people at hardware stores, shit-to-corona-parties, traffic jams headed for the beaches and forests. After all, it was spring and there was still beer and chips everywhere.
Years in nothing seems to have changed. The longer we continue to run, because the lockdowns over here are mostly merely symbolic, the longer this pandemic takes, the stricter measures will become. Ofcourse we will spread it by moving around in groups, cooped up in buildings and offices.
I have been back to work from May 2020, we were simply ordered, our pupils have special needs, so I resumed teaching in class and online. Keep your distance but stay compliant and carry on!
Summer was coming and a virologist said that we may have to take restrictions into account until into the next year. Or longer. Until there is a vaccine. Untill most of us are vaccinated. And still people said "it's just a flu! People will die, it happens every day, surely we will not shut down the machine for that every single time a new virus surfaces... will we?". And they were going to get an ice cream. "Cheer up, it may never happen! Why are we so worried about overweight people in their eighties who smoke? We all die at one point!".
Thanks motherfuckers...
In September 2020 all other schools opened up again as well. People have to work after all, kids have to be kept off the streets. Young people however are just as well afflicted with this epidemic. And I am still surprised that we assume children or pupils play virtually no role in this story. Unwitting purveyors in medical jargon. Heaven forbid that we should keep our offspring inside and teach them ourselves, there are bills to be paid, for f*cks sake! Schools and shops are super spreaders, but we don't assume that in some rigid stubborn way. We didn't assume many things. We didn't solve this with scientists, we waited for our governments to act. But they could not do a bloody thing. Did that really surprise us? Really?
It's like a bad movie. We still don't believe this is about us. That we could get held hostage in our houses with our families . That we are not supposed to see it like that does not matter to me. And the same goes for the fact that I'm not alone in this. Maybe I'll care about that again tomorrow. I'm sick of it now and would like to walk away from this whole thing. It feels like a social experiment that got out of hand.
The shop that is our country constantly complains; "Listen, we want protection and we want to open everything up again and oh yes, we also want a lot of money in order to do so. Everybody!, keep spending money! ." Just now when it slowly becomes apparent how unjustly invulnerable we always feel, life is what you make it, right? In mid-January 2020 we had the first confirmed case of the virus in the Netherlands. When should we have acted? Extra respirators were not ordered until mid-March. At the end of March, there was still not enough PPE for healthcare workers in hospitals and for home care workers. At the beginning of April, there were still no test kits for people who work in the healthcare sector and we collectively realized that we still had too little capacity on the ICs for this kind of situation in terms of personnel. Next waves of mutations will be a repetition of this. But we don't call this a "dangerous situation", we euphemistically call it "a close call". Just as well that our "intelligent dashboard" until whenever should not be called a lockdown. As if the terminology still matters. As if what we did or not do made a significant difference.
The shop that is our country constantly complains; "Listen, we want protection and we want to open everything up again and oh yes, we also want a lot of money in order to do so. Everybody!, keep spending money! ." Just now when it slowly becomes apparent how unjustly invulnerable we always feel, life is what you make it, right? In mid-January 2020 we had the first confirmed case of the virus in the Netherlands. When should we have acted? Extra respirators were not ordered until mid-March. At the end of March, there was still not enough PPE for healthcare workers in hospitals and for home care workers. At the beginning of April, there were still no test kits for people who work in the healthcare sector and we collectively realized that we still had too little capacity on the ICs for this kind of situation in terms of personnel. Next waves of mutations will be a repetition of this. But we don't call this a "dangerous situation", we euphemistically call it "a close call". Just as well that our "intelligent dashboard" until whenever should not be called a lockdown. As if the terminology still matters. As if what we did or not do made a significant difference.
It is now clear, everywhere, that our pandemic protocols are only symbolic politics. There is no plan. There never was a plan. Not anywhere. It may not be possible either. A plan for something like that. No one could imagine ever ending up in such an absurd tale. That is a universal phenomenon.
This virus is not worried about politics, this whole thing should have been about science in the first place, from the start.
Governments can only ring companies up after items they have ordered.
Containment makes no sense if you are caught off guard.
It seems there is just one message left ; Stay at home and distance from others, but also stay helpful, cheerful and most of all productive.
The years pass. Outside everything was in bloom, then the leaves were turning, the indian summer called us to come outside and then, come winter, the message was still; "Everyone must fight together against the invisible enemy!".
We have to conclude, in all reasonableness, that limiting a part of our freedom is done in the context of a higher interest. This virus is real after all, it exists, it is mutating, it is unpredictable, vaccines can do only so much as to prevent most of us from keeling over, and you can't realy blame that fact on anyone. We therefore had no other option then to remain away from infected, weak or unvaccinated people and we even stayed indoors for them from time to time. Virtualy no or very little social interaction for the time being was the rule. You could get fined. We could report groups that did not keep enough distance, we had become a sentinel state overnight. There are people who will call the police if someone dares to walk on a closed beach for too long or entertain too many people. If we get to sit somewhere in a park or on a beach, we have to do it within an imaginary circle. Only within your own square, family or bubble. The rest at a distance. And it still is the mantra. You should not visit old people. Make video calls with parents or loved ones sitting at home alone. Do not attend large public events. But sure!, go to those footballmatches and fairgrounds. As long as you don't sing or shout and sit down. And try not to break a leg, because in that case care facilities must be expanded again and that is far too expensive. Get tested, but only if you think you already know the answer. A soft voice in my head constantly whispers nastily; "That's why we have to keep the peak low for the time being. Because of the money. Because there are not enough resources to test and trace properly. Because there is a structural shortage in healthcare. In supplies. In infrastructure.
When will our 24 hour economy be labeled as an important key? In the end, we were all too late with any measure whatsoever. How long before we realize that we are no longer saving lives, but merely the budgets of governments that couldn't care less and will do so again. Remember this when celebrations are being cancelled untill far into the next year, except maybe in countries where governments are willing to take more risks. We do this because for years there has been budgeted for corona-free times. Cheap times. You don't need extra IC capacity if everything keeps going well. After all: It is more profitable under market forces if you have just enough places in scarce nursing homes and on IC-units, if it all can be done with minimal staff present in hospitals and clinics. It was unclear when and how we all would be able to get vaccinated for a long time as other countries were allready gearing up for that. With the boostershots no different. My anger about this hypocritical neo-liberal way of ruling this country, the actual underlying crisis, is losing out to the solidarity I truly want to feel towards the people who currently work in the care sector and towards vulnerable people in my immediate circle and in society.
It is crucial. My conscience obliges me.
I took the jabs. I wear the mask. Should we have used face masks? We were told that masks for people outside the healthcare system were false safety and would not change anything... They might change it all a little bit, it works in Asia, so why not try? I kept moving forward as best as I could . But it still is not over yet, not by a long shot. What else should I do from now on? Freeze or carry on? Stay in or
not? Carrying around the virus unwittingly to pupils, family and friends
and not thinking about whether it is my fault if the brilliant unvaccinated or the unlucky vaccinated fall ill, when I
really have no symptoms myself? Pass it round when I go through stores,
because I pick up stuff to read what I buy and because I change clothes
and put them back on the rack? And keep doing that because we have reached this point where we all have to take the risk, take it on the
chin, and get used to that?
This is how we live! We gather and celebrate. We are mostly close to others. We have to, in this tiny country. We never in our lifetime were content with only just sleeping and working.
We choose governments that we think will work for us. But what if the world is changing so fast that none of us can keep up with it? Shouldn't a government be able to adapt to that and make different choices? Should we not hold them accountable for spending our money on wrong choices, instead of collectively trying to meet the governments' own needs, by changing how we live? Should we not controll our governments, instead of the other way around? If I fuck up like that at my job, over a period of decades, I would have been fired.
The majority of people in this country are going to learn their lessons the hard way. Neo-liberalism will bite everybody in the ass at some point. So change your vote or change your way of life.
You may be well off, but are you happy with this? Are you happy with your chosen representation? What to do with heads of government and PMs who claimed to be immune from the start? They cough secretly in their elbows when no one can hear it, otherwise they have to be quarantined and that means no more freedom of movement. They went on hollidays, had gatherings themselves and urged you to stay in...
At the end of March 2020, the pointing out at each other had already begun, slightly hidden and not yet out loud, because it was necessary to practice symbolic politics. Some politicians saw an opportunity and went the other way for their votes and claimed it was all a hoax, the virus and the remedy.
Running a re-election campaign with rallies seems untimely in times of crisis, but this virus will probably not last forever, and chances are vital, you should not waste them. You also have to work on a story in which you were not to blame for it all in the end. Work hard on an explanation about how a country had to be partialy locked in, but we also wanted people to continue to function and consume. The one who manages to save the economy will undoubtedly win the next elections. Ultimately, it is mistrust and greed that fucks us up in situations like these. We have reached a point where politicians are just starting to randomly shout something, afraid of losing momentum. There are still wars being fought, bombs are still being thrown. It won't be long before we start worrying about the old pre-corona themes again. For the time being politicians, influencers and rich people can simply go wherever they want, at least to a certain extent, because they have the means and the money to do this.
There are presidents and Dutch MPs who reassure us that one day the virus, "it is a miracle!", will be gone all by itself. They babble about the sun, bleach, herd-mentality (slow but mostly effective and ultimately cheap) and a salty sea breeze, as if a virus is a living organism that has peed on your sidewalk.
There is your theory, assholes! We passed the two year mark and counting and people are still dying. In times of crisis, I trust politicians just before an election as far as I can throw them.
The other thing that fucks me up is how easyly we are set up against each other. The vaccine should have been the gamechanger. It could have been the way out. Instead it became a weapon in an information war. Conspiracists have a chance here to get votes. They victimize themselves and ultimately create an environment in which a virus can mutate endlessly. Some out there create this shitstorm over and over again in the name of freedom and love. "Give me your vote! I will make it all better! I am different from the others.....!". It worked. The mutation came. And they won their seats in parliament.
For almost two years I continued to do my job, move along, try to be considerate or at least sensible. I can take the remedy or wait untill covid vanishes on its own. Those are the two choices. We will all have to build up antibodies over time, with or without vaccin. But things keep reverting to this state in which we all have to stand still again, where we periodicaly slip back in to a swamp. The bog where we also have to mind ignorant luddites, retarded zealots who oppose everything that science or society has to offer....
I am tempted to scream at them: " Ok! Time to turn the tables. You stay in this time, I go out now!".
Governments widen this rift in our societies by blaming the public for everything that is happening now. Politicians divided us in two camps. 20%-80%, unvaccinated and vaccinated. Really? This is how we will define society from now on? And do they believe that this is the only thing that defines us? I may have taken the jabs, but do you really believe I aggree with you, or am willing to stay in line indefinetly? I may not believe in conspiracies, but do you think I will still comply if you do not do your job properly? What choices do I have in the face of this health-crisis? My life used to be a lot more then just thinking about how to survive a disease or how to get through my workday.
We are nowhere near the way I used to live, and I am still not used to that yet, nor do I want to. Governments everywhere are dumbfounded. In the face of a pandemic they all turned out to be clueless and inadequate. You can't blame the virus on them, but they simply don't seem to be making a big difference, nowhere.
Instead we play the blamegame with eachother. And the government chimes in because...well....because they can. I am fed up with that. It is my society too, and they are breaking it. Divide and rule.
So here we are. Government campaigns that encourage us for getting through this "together" make me sick every now and then. "Only together we can win this battle!". I can't bear to hear it anymore. "Mainly alone" they mean. Locked up in our own heads, our own houses, rule of six, rule of four, rule of two, back to four, no mixing of bubbles, curfews, all of a sudden more or less total freedom for a while, untill we are once again clubbed back in to the small circle of our nuclear family if numbers are getting too steep. We'll never know whether half the government was corona positive, like the rest of us.
If I can continue to govern through twitter, am I indispensable? Who has the bullshit job here? They may mean that by "the new normal". Wartalk. Conspiracies.
Everybody appears to be living in their own reality. Cult-like beliefs that result in the conclusion that even gravity is merely an opinion. Newspeak has been promoted to mainstream language.
Now especially I want politicians to shut up and not shout out about things they were never educated in. Or they should have paid more attention in Biology class earlier in school. Even I understood. A bacterium is a unicellular micro organism. That can be broken or killed by antibiotics. A virus is a kind of "nanocomputer" that rewrites the function of your own cells and gets its "power" from those cells. It does not live by itself. So cannot die either. It is inactively waiting to be picked up. It must be completely demolished, otherwise it will continue to calculate. Those are facts. No bullshit over a good glass of wine.
I am not a scientist. But I assume scientists in general know what they are talking about. At least they know more than I do. I try to think logically. That doesn't always work, but it usually does. I like facts. Scientists do not usually make mistakes with facts. Like the rest of us however, scientists sometimes make mistakes with interpretations and estimates. Even then, I'd rather listen to a scientist than a politician.
I still have a job. I am not in danger. I never was, not in this golden cage. In the material sense I am just fine. But don't euphoricaly shout at me that this whole situation is a great gift. That this may be the beginning of a new era. A period in which we will learn a lot of meaningful things.
Wtf? How nice that you can now work on yourself, that you have quality time within your very small circle and in your relationships, that you finally have "peace and space", that you were right about a lot of things that finally will be placed on the political agenda, that you were right about things you've always claimed to be relevant.
Don't complain if you find yourself on the same page as me on any given day. If you're suddenly sick of it tomorow, the next month or sometime in the future.
Don't criticize me if I don't share your enthusiasm for all these valuable lessons of today. I simply cannot. This is my weakness. Deal with it. I just don't see any positive elements in all the numbers, nor in what it does to us as a society. Do not only be “honest” with me, but also with yourself.
The economy is important. For sure. But the psychological and mental impact of this could be more vital and will be widely underestimated. Reactions will follow.
Congratulations on this time of reflection. But are you asking yourself the right questions? Are you ready yet? For second, third and more waves? For new strains? For more calls from the ICs and from the nursing homes? For the question whether or not resuscitation is required? Have you already come up with a solution for how to act if someone drops out of your immediate family, and you don't know how to be close to someone who is alone and sad? Have you armed yourself against the inevitable trajectory to come; the "one and a half meter society"? Want to keep your distance for a few more weeks? A few months? Years? Every next wave? During a new virus that comes along? Are you looking forward to this new world? Of 3G, 2G, 1G or "nothing and good luck!"? Back to square one?
Not me.
Shock, I learned, comes in stages, just like grief or divorce, burnout, after an accident or trauma.
Phase 1: shock and need for denial.
Phase 2: anger.
Phase 3: negotiation, stating intentions.
Phase 4: depression.
Phase 5: acceptance and seeking connection.
One does not go through those phases chronologically. I see a more chaotic and therefore more contradictory image in myself and those around me; navigating between amazement and denial, care, withdrawal, strategy determination, aggression, depression, and hopefully eventually restoring contact from the need for connection.
In any case, my own mental health has been hit hard. My long-lasting "depressive episode" has to settle for a backburner spot in this light. I gradually become more and more taciturn. From this constricted stay-indefinitely-at-home-with-your-bubble-but-work-hard-do-your-chores--and-keep-pumping-money-around-story. And this "new world" that everyone is trying to interpret all day.
I am told not to complain. That's how you handle that! Tell someone who is depressed "to put up with it and just stop moaning." It may also work if you tell the fucking virus to bugger off. Or not.
But I only think things like this on the very black days. On good days I am more gentle and rational. I now store it somewhere and prefer not to share it with anyone in “real life” or during conversations. Pointless. Everyone has enough on their plate for themselves at the moment.
I am happy to hear from people. But sometimes it is also hard work. You have to maneuver around the conspiracy theories and the rubbish. People constantly tell you what to do. They only add up the misery that is in store for us. Some take you down for every wrong word. Some fill in every blank for me and others. Some honk that this is the best thing ever happened to them. I know that people are bluffing in order not to give in to their own panic. Surviving mentally, that's what we are doing.
I don't know what hurts more. The physical and mental distance between me and the world or the distance that people now constantly create unconsciously by talking complete and utter sectarian bollocks.
The latest thing that happened to me and forced me to count to one hundred was tricky, I had a choice between silence or violence, you tell me what I should have done; there are people out there that ask you if it was the vaccine that killed your loved ones, before they take the political stage and moral highground and tell you what you should read or think, they start preaching about Red Pills and Great Resets, instead of saying what they should say, the only thing that is appropriate in a situation like that, which simply is "I am sorry for your loss...".
Everything connected with this virus will hopefully be over soon and we must quickly forget how some have hurt or disappointed us. We will soon be able to meet up and party again. But on some days I don't know how many people I will have left with whom I want to do that later. A lot needs to be repaired. We can all only go on if forgiveness is the default first, I think.
A virus is only partially levelling the playingfield. Only partially an equalizer. It also painfully exposes inequality. Every society can now show what it represents. These are golden times for data researchers. The wait is on the day we all come to a halt because we find out that we all had to catch the same wave and it was not easy at all, it was an outright disaster. Regardless of the tactics employed, the same number of victims can be found statistically everywhere. The precariat is growing in numbers on a daily basis. The same economic and mental repercussions are demonstrated everywhere. That makes us smaller and more powerless as humans than ever. So much for the makeable world. We are now constantly living in the "next wave", the big Corona-lottery, and if we get sick we did something wrong...
I feel a huge disappointment heading for everyone who thought this period would change all of us a lot for the better, for everyone who hoped to come out of all of this completely different and improved. Some might though. The world is bound to turn back to a "new normal" of sorts, and I fear I also changed, but only because I was pushed, not because I felt the need to, and certainly not for the best.
The world went insane. Maybe I did too.
Do I blame "the people" for this mess? I don't know. But I am entering the stage where I will break the rules when I see fit. If it wil end up keeping me safer, and keeps me away from the herd I observed in the last couple of years, the one that couldn't give a shit all this time, it is in my eyes justified. That is not breaking a rule, that is selfprotection. A part of this society refuses to wake up to the harsh reality of a virus and finds it hard to make sacrifices. Where I had to justify myself for protecting myself and others, for stepping back, ridiculed and shamed, being called a stupid sleeper, a left-wing fascist, anti social... I have a right to steer away from those people.
And if governments can't come up with a sufficient plan to protect everybody, and you can not trust a huge section of the public around you to act remotely responsible, people can only protect themselves. Even if that means to get away from the masses all governments now desperately seek to controll.
As for governments: Never again fence me in for my so called own safety. I don't approve of the motives in this one. If people were allowed for months to travel for fun and keep the precious economy going, to join a stupid political rally or to go to a footballmatch, they should also have the right to travel to safety. Locking people up, sometimes without due warning or over a course of hours, as has happened a few times, and keep shutting us all down, is not the optimal answer to a pandemic. A vaccine or a remedy is, or at least it could have been, if taken. I will not wait anywhere ever again untill I get infected. So travelban and quarantine or not, I will not simply obey from now on. It is absurd that I am forced to fight dirty in the end. I did not break the social contract. I am still trying to uphold it. I will keep it small, I will be taking my responsibility for myself and those I care for. That is what freedom should be.
And yet....I miss a lot of people. I miss my friends abroad, my kid in London, the random contacts I have and the people that make me happy. We have all become loose sand. I realy miss the freedom to travel, I will never again take it for granted that I can cross borders without quarantine-travelling rules or post-brexit-visa. I miss festivals, gatherings, other cities, new faces. I crave them now...
Sorry I am such a cynic. We will meet again on the other side. Until then, I do what I allways do. I'll just try. I try not to sink away too far. I try to teach. I try to stay safe every time it all flares up again. I try to be approachable. I listen to music and try not to think.
I will love, honor and protect those I hold dear...
PS. If someone reads this, feel free to reach out...please...!
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