A new kind of normal

I’ve tried to write over the last number of days but couldn’t. Life has changed, is changing, for everyone. There should be comfort in numbers, knowing that we aren’t alone, but there isn’t.

Mother’s Day came and went. A day I wouldn’t previously have paid much heed to, this year was different. The first year without my mum and the first year not being able to see my beautiful daughter. If things were normal we’d have gone off for afternoon tea, we’d have had the chats and the laughs and it would have been a wonderful day. But there’s no such thing as normal anymore.

I worry about my family, my friends, the rest of the world. I worry about the businesses that have had to close. I know how heartbreaking it is for them. I worry about the people who have said goodbye to loved ones. Some haven’t even been able to say goodbye, due to travel restrictions.

I think back to previous disasters, such as the cholera epidemic, this was a big part of Sligo history. I don’t know how people coped back then. We have media now so we are kept informed but sometimes I think that can be a bad thing.

I’m seeing tempers rising on Social Media, there’s a feeling that some people are spoiling for a fight. On the other hand I’m seeing kindness of the like that I’ve never seen before. People going out of their way to do good and help others.

For a few blissful seconds each morning when I wake I don’t think about the virus and what the world is going through and then it hits all over again. A few weeks ago I’d be woken by car doors slamming, now it’s birdsong and calves crying for their mothers.

I remind myself that this too shall pass. We just have to hang on in there and try to keep calm, which is easier said than done.