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I& #39;m still living like a person in lockdown. I& #39;m staying in our house & garden & going for walks in the huge green space nearby. I get all my food delivered & have been putting off going to the post office for over a week because it requires going to the high street. 1/
The only people I& #39;ve seen in person since the first week of March have been my four housemates, my housemate& #39;s children & their partners, my BFF Jason (once), a housemate& #39;s friend (once). All the non-members of the household in the garden only. 2/
I should be longing to return to normal life & I am, but... I& #39;ve become so accustomed to this reclusive life, within such a short time, that I feel daunted. The idea of arranging to meet people, of crossing the city & back within one evening, 3/
of spending money on my Oystercard & on frivolities like coffee (on my income). Of going dancing. It all feels like such a fag. I& #39;m living the life of least resistance: going nowhere, doing nothing. 4/
Of course, my situation is unusually blessed. I work from home anyway. I lived with close friends whom I love, so I have conversation & companionship on tap. I live in a beautiful house with a lovely garden on the edge of a huge area of woodland & heath (in London, JUST). 5/
But still it& #39;s scary how quickly one becomes—well, I think the closest term is institutionalised. It& #39;s a kind of learned helplessness that is very familiar to me from other times in my life. 6/
I was terrified of leaving Cambridge after my PhD. I thought it was the most beautiful place on earth & it felt so easy to spend all my time simply reading & writing. I didn& #39;t want to face other responsibilities & try to feel at home in less effortlessly lovely places. 7/
I stayed in academe for eleven years, despite feeling very unhappy in that career, because I was so daunted by the idea of finding another vocation, of entering the free job market. (I became a dance teacher, which was a fun but appallingly impractical choice). 8/
I stayed in my relationship for even longer. It took years to leave. I was daunted by the idea of being single again & I didn& #39;t want to lose our home together, our comfortable lifestyle & start again from scratch, with nothing—& it was hard. 9/
I& #39;m an extravert: I& #39;m not a natural recluse. I& #39;m happiest surrounded by friends. But I& #39;m having that feeling again. I can sense the seductive tug of entropy. The time to cut the umbilical cord & face the wider world again is imminent & I am feeling a tiny bit scared. 10/
