What I'll miss

April 2020

O N E // day soon, I’m certain we’ll miss what we have now.

One day soon, we’ll be allowed back outside, shops will reopen and restaurants will take bookings again. We’ll be able to have coffee in the park and play at playgrounds without fear of arrest, we’ll hug our friends when we see them and pop in to visit family without hesitation.

We won’t have to question the essentialness of our purchases or justify our outings. We’ll happily stop and chat in the supermarket and will be able to attend face to face appointments. One day soon, we’ll have our freedom back and our own safety, along with the safety and health of our community will no longer be at risk.

One day soon, we’ll go back to the normal we’ve always known. But I know, once this is all over, we will miss this time. It will be a historic, but treasured memory.

It’ll forever be the time that the world stopped turning but family time remained. When the mornings were slower, the days were longer and the weeks felt like months. It’ll be remembered for it’s silence in the streets, but the noise in the household. When families spent hours in the vegetable garden and finished the home projects that had been put off for too long.

It’ll be the time when parents got down on the floor and played with their kids, like really played. And the time when there were more yes answers than no. It’ll forever be known as the time when parents had their partners home to help with the 5pm witching hour, when family dinners were a regular event and both parents kissed the kids goodnight.

It’ll be the time when puzzles were sprawled along coffee tables for days on end and the board game cupboard was always open. When families walked their dogs every day and enjoyed the sunshine in their backyards. It’ll be known as the time teachers true value was finally understood and the time when people realised just how incredibly grateful they were for the frontline workers.

It’ll always be remembered as the time when families put themselves first - before the rat race, before their jobs, before society - so that our world could get back to our normal, safely.

One day soon we’ll miss what we have now.