So on the 1st of May South Africa
entered Level 4 of our 5 stage Covid – 19 lockdown period, whether it stays this way
remains to be seen seeing as Cape Town (where I stay) is now the noted
epicenter of the outbreak -I will refrain from jumping for joy just yet.
With level 4 came some pretty
exciting things like…. Being able to exercise between the hours of 6am and 9am
on a daily basis, I cannot tell you how amazing it was on May 1st to
take a walk outside with my kids; their first time out of the house and garden
for 5 weeks and to hear all the doggies barking excitedly as their owners took
them out for the first time in too long, its cruel to be honest I really had a
problem with the not walking your dog thing, animals don’t understand and it isn’t
fair, my neighbor has two very large dogs and our duplexes are not big I felt
so terrible sorry for them when I saw them gazing longingly out the window… I
would also like to point out that at 6am it is still dark, Winter is coming so
it will only get darker and colder so it’s almost impossible to take the kids
out before 7am and if you work that just isn’t possible, the number of people
out at the same time is also a bit ridiculous I personally think that giving a
morning and afternoon time slot would have been better all around… but I
digress.
You can now buy clothes but some
stores have prohibited the sale of underwear, you could buy toys on level 5 but
it now considered non essential in level 4, you can also buy make up and the
spaza shops are open but nail techs and hairdressers are still banned.
With level 4 also came the long
awaited (for me) cigarette ban lift… oh wait no they banned it again; I am a
smoker and I was beyond livid, during this time it is the only reprieve and
slip of sanity I have had in the midst of home-schooling the kids and
everything else; the reasoning's are flawed and every time I get into it I just go off the deep end of anger so let's move on.
With level 4 also came a list of
industries that were allowed to return to work, given the state of our economy
this is great and I was quite excited when I saw that my industry was one of
those allowed to venture back into the ‘normal’ world… however with 3 kids at
home and a hubby also faced with a return to work I have to be honest I was
panicking, of course the government can sing its song and tell employers to be
kind and to take these things into consideration but not everyone can do their job
from home and with no money coming in more and more people are facing pay cuts
and company shutdowns every day.
Honestly the prospect of ending
up on the street or not being able to feed my family or even get my son his
meds is scarier to me than the possibility of catching the virus.
So fast forward to this week and
I returned to work on a rotational schedule to accommodate the fact that I
still have kids at home (I am very lucky) and then my hubby got told that he is
going to be home until much… much later this year and thus I know have a house-husband…
yay me right!?
I think it hit my hubby pretty
hard at first, he wants to be back at work he is craving some normalcy and the
kids are going bonkers at home so I can’t blame him, it’s ironic really to see
so many introverted people suddenly craving or developing a need to run free
amongst the living so to speak, it’s been an emotional roller coaster ride and I
think everyone I know has had at least one meltdown over the past few weeks.
Now that my hubby is home I am
able to work more which is great but it is strange and truth be told I do miss
having the time with the kids although mentally I think I am a much happier
parent- last night I came home exhausted took a shower and then plomped onto
the bed to watch Peter Rabbit with my youngest; he was so happy and then I
chased my other two around for loves… it’s good to breathe, its good to be the
parent I want to be instead of the frustrated anxious mess that I have been at
times over the past 6 weeks- I take my hat off to stay at home moms I really
do.
School wise we are doing well,
our curriculum is built for home-schooling so it has been easy to navigate and
use it at home and we are practically done with the second term work the kids
are either doing revision or finishing up a subject or two so I am really happy
we pushed a little harder in the beginning as we can now relax the slacks a bit
and there is less pressure on hubby while I am at work.
I start my day off with a 6am
walk/run, get ready for the day, prep dinner and set out the school work, tidy
up a bit and get breakfast done if the kids are up and off I go to work only to
barrel through the door exhausted at 6pm take a shower eat dinner and
eventually fall into bed, I tell you during lock down I was up until 2am most
night and now I am barely making 11/12 o clock but it feels good and I am
beyond grateful that we are one of the lucky families with jobs to go back to,
a roof over our heads and food on the table, it is a new kind of normal, a
strange space of in-between but we will get there.
I hope everyone is safe and
healthy
XoXo
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