21/3/20
Travel restrictions are setting in place. I watch as people I know are locked down in remote communities, plan to move from city to country, race overseas to be with family before they cannot, spend last weekends with loved ones. It's being predicted that the COVID 19 crisis could last 3-18 months.
I take my baby to the doctors today for her 4 month vaccinations. My regular GP is closed for face to face appointments, so I'm at our back up GP. I count 32 posters about COVID 19, in various languages, while I wait for her appointment.
The current restrictions are 1 person per 4 square metres or 1.5m of space between people. I am so conscious of where everyone else is in the waiting room, even though it's not very busy. I pull my sleeve over my hand to open and close doors. I've never been so aware of what I'm touching.
I keep realising and re-realising that nothing like this has occurred in my lifetime before. Waiting for mandatory self isolation feels like looking over the abyss and waiting to fall in. You don't know how deep the abyss is, or how long mandatory self isolation will last. Teachers have been directed to spend the last two days of term creating online learning content so mandatory school closures must be coming.