Lockdown Diary. Day 42.
The days are merging into one another. Shopping and planning meals has provided the only structure to this strange new life. Although I keep reminding myself that I should feel grateful – I’m in good health with good company and comfortable accommodation, eating very well – I find myself growing angry at these constant constraints. I don’t want to have to write another f****ng shopping list!
But still I write them. And I draw. I draw what is around me… My walking shoes, when I was thinking about the cancelled walking holiday that I should have started today. I draw the bag of flour that I found on the supermarket shelf, after weeks of searching, that I hurried home with, as if running from an illicit drugs deal.
I draw bottles of wine, that I look forward to drinking at the weekend – another constraint, but self-imposed, to protect my liver during lockdown.
I drew my girlfriend’s shoes, when I felt sad that we haven’t been able to go out anywhere for a long time. Our own caution meant we stopped going to bars or restaurants a month before the official look down.
Without restaurants or cafés, I have found myself spending an awful lot of time planning and preparing meals. A weekly menu – another list! – helps avoid constant repetition of my old favourites. Yesterday I cooked my first rosti!
And then there’s the teddy bear. He has become a regular model. I suspect that I see my drawings of him as self-portraits. So why does he look so sad all the time.?
