The ultimate scolding: sit in the corner and think about what you had done.

It is just over a year ago, that we were locked down full throttle.

Let me honestly declare, that I was in, there is no other way to say this, “a tizzed up state”. I had visions of zombie apocalypse in the streets of Windhoek. Admittedly, Windhoek does not really count a s a city, rather a small collection of towns. But still – deserted streets, looted and abandoned storefronts, milling my own flour from the one stalk of sorghum I found in the yard. Yep, full on “end of days”. It was so bad, that I could not watch my usual move fare of dystopian futures, the flavour of that month being Handmaid’s tale. It was simply too close for comfort.

Our farm staff had their daily “CORONA education and training”, vitamin supplements and personally crafted masks in the event they had no choice but to leave the confines of the farm boundaries.

I did not go as far as stocking up hundreds of rolls of toilet paper, but pasta, flour, butter, and sugar featured quite highly on my staples stockpile.

Now, a year later, I sat back this week, and thought about all the “goodwill” and “self-reliance” that was created by COVID-19. I am happy that the dolphin’s frolicked through the canals of Venice. Or that Flamingos were covering lakes in India. Experts and professionals offering their services for free, whether by way of calming meditation apps, or how to videos; and general talking to each other through social media, neighbour windows, and over distanced fences.

You often saw visual confirmation that the absence of people was a good time for our mother earth to take a breath.

What else has transpired? Lots of baking, which means my own authentic home-made baked goods is not quite so exclusive anymore, but you know what, I love seeing the auras of pleasure of discovered abilities beaming through the CORONA casing of restrictions.

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I also learned about myself, that I can procrastinate – professionally. To the extent that I rope in my lockdown mates into workshopping a priority list.

Since then, things have changed, and remained the same. Commonly called an Aenigma. Certainly, a greater degree of cleanliness and basic hygiene than before C-19, with some less stressful focus on covering yourself from head to toe than at the introduction of C-19. But elsewhere, like India, is back to the basic suffering and death.

A little more empathy for poorly staff members, with less knee jerk complete lockout and whole building sterilisation if someone sneezes. But the abuse of “I think I sat next to a CORONA virus on the bus and can’t come into the office today” has replaced the “common stomach bug”.

What I wish to see now, is progression from that enforced global stock take period.

I do not have puzzles going at the moment, but I have acclimatized that newly strengthened attention-span brain muscle, to studying towards a module of a post graduate degree. Which I will use to generate income when I get closer to my early retirement living of the land goal.

Working from home was wearisome for several reasons, but it has taught me how to lock myself away for a very productive day.

Carbon emissions have reduced radically, because “very important people” have been introduced to the idea that the world will continue without their in-person presence at regular board meetings, so meetings have become more focused on the essence of the matter at hand.

An ever so tentative trickle of tourists have returned to the wide-open spaces of Namibia, and I wish to see more. Many more.

I continue to learn from all the webinars (which is shorthand for “seminars I would not have attended prior to C-19 due to travel and time requirements”) but miss the refined nuances of networking during 100+ public events.

This week I took my vaccination, and happy to report that there is nothing to report. If I were prepared before to take a yellow fever vaccination just because I was travelling to Indonesia or Uganda, why would I not take a CORONA vaccination? Let me take this opportunity to compliment Lady Pohamba Private Hospital and Ministry of Health and Social Services. It was very well organised, very well thought through, and I bought pancakes & tea just because you were not abusing the captive 15 minutes waiting post injection audience with unethical pricing.

It feels like we have mostly moved on from this life lesson, but I worry that we are losing some of the values we learned from this life lesson.

What newly discovered (or rediscovered) skill did you carry forward from our universal scolding to sit in the corner and think about what we had done?