Life in lockdown – Being creative at the time of COVID19

This is going to be a strange post… and there will be probably more to see than to read. Here in UK we have been on official lockdown for a bit more than a week now due to the outbreak of COVID19 and people are re-adjusting as they can to a new reality that will last for a while. It has been amazing see (especially online) what people are coming up with to keep themselves busy in this period; from the funniest mimes to the most educative videos, from incredible flash-mob displays to ’80s style exercise video streams. I’m lucky enough to have a job that I can do from home to a fairly productive extent but then after work, living alone and having to isolate is a bit of a challenge in a way. You see, in normal times I cherish the solitude I, too often, seek but that is by choice; in this unprecedented moment I really don’t have a choice so I came up with a few rules for the weeks to come: 1) establish and stick to a routine 2) from week to week start (and finish!!!) a creative project 3) don’t lose it, at least not completely.

This post is about rule 2 and what I came up with for my first week on lockdown. I called it the “Window Challenge”. The idea was to take one picture per day for a week from the same window and below is the result which you can see also on my Facebook page and my Instagram gallery.

DAY ONE

The lockdown in UK started March 23rd 2020. Before this date HMG only gave people the “strong advice” to not go out in crowded places such as pubs and restaurants.

DAY TWO

I live in a market town in England called Nantwich. In the UK were classified as market towns small rural settlements that were given legal right to hold a weekly market.

DAY THREE

By now it should be clear that I live in an apartment. The window I choose to conduct my challenge from, faces an enclosed courtyard surrounded by other buildings and, yes… there chimneys, lots of chimneys!

DAY FOUR

I took this shot in the early hours of the day; usually there isn’t much noise anyway but after a few days of lockdown the silence at any time of the day is apparent and wild creatures seem to be emboldened by the reduced human activity.

DAY FIVE

After a few days of clear skies clouds start to appear in the sky. As I write the weather isn’t any better and in a way goes with my mood. I’m Italian and my family and friends live in the worst affected area of Italy and I can’t avoid being awfully worried abut them all.

DAY SIX

If there is one good thing about the lockdown here in UK is the fact that one of the few reasons people are allowed to go out is for some exercise in their area… no, driving your car for 20+ miles to go to a park to walk your dog is not classified as “your area”. A bit of running helps me a lot and gives me a way to keep separated reality (for as bad as it is) from unhelpful darker thoughts. What’s your way to deal with similar situations?

DAY SEVEN

This is the last shot of the Window Challenge and if one thing is sure is that the lockdown won’t be over that quickly. I will write more about it and if there is one thing I should do before I publish this is to apologise. I want to apologise because I’ve been wanting to write something about this period we are going through way before today but things are moving so quickly that every time I set out to write about it the situation has already changed. It is also true that my emotions and thoughts have evolved and changed quickly as well and I realise that, despite not there being anything wrong with it, I want to feel sufficiently firm on my views. To make this a bit more clear: I was also of those that thought that closing everything (in Italy) was an over reaction (almost a month ago), then a couple of weeks ago I expressed quite strong views about the situation in Italy and the government response not being strong enough, and then again later, I was enraged when, in my mind, HMG did not react quickly or strongly enough. So, as you can see, I’m still looking for my views on this but one thing is for sure: no matter what my opinion will be at the end of this now it is not time for sterile finger pointing and criticisms that don’t give any useful alternative… we are in this together and only together we will get out.