Cafes, coffee, the joys of reading, running, and the sense of opportunity: some of the recent little things we’ve discovered anew in the past few months as Dublin’s lockdown has gradually eased.
Despite having never watched the Marie Kondo series, I am familiar with the phrase ‘things that spark joy’. There used to be many such ‘things’ but as life happened this past year, and remnants of the year before that, finding things that sparked joy became more of a continuous present verb than an infinite one. Reading, once a joy, is now ghastly to me. Anything sedentary that requires looking into an abyss of glare, namely screens, is a big no. Yes, Zoom university and certain necessities still call for it but, does it spark Joy? Particularly not. The simple task of texting has become an ordeal. Having one-on-one conversations, listening to people at normal speed and not the religiously acquired 2x Zoom speed that I used for what was, believe me, all my lectures, is strange to me.
Reflecting on my ever changing personality and how acutely different I have become, I often pause to think how many, if not all these traits, once sparked joy. I was once a reader, even if that meant reading the Perks of Being a Wallflower five times over. I also just loved talking to people – out loud, nonchalantly, about anything really! As a film buff, I used to do movie marathons but it is hard to sit through one without moving thrice for popcorn I definitely could do without. Nobody could justify three bowls of popcorn with good reason anyway. Instead of the partly romanticised life I lived pre-pandemic, I run now. I listen to podcasts while I’m at it and do everything with a hazy sense of rush. It sounds harsher but this newfound routine has kept me on my toes. I feel healthier with a routine, something I had never considered previously. Running, once labelled by me as an abhorrent sin, is now the very thing that sparks joy.
Ms. Kondo, from my vague understanding, thinks of joy earned in the moment. I have adopted a meta approach to say that joy differs, changes and shapeshifts with the person you are. I believe I will regain parts of myself that I have lost, someday, perhaps even in a somewhat altered manner. While I know I can’t identify with my fondness for film at the minute, I strongly believe I’ll be crying to Lady Bird again. I know I’ll regain my extrovertness but perhaps with a better sense of who I’m spending my energy on. And yes, I will be reading again although I know it’ll still be the Perks of Being a Wallflower. Things that once sparked joy, will spark joy again but until then, I hope to embrace this eerie newfound ethic for living.
Aditi Kapoor
Talk of the pandemic by now hits the same sour note, but a recent memory dug up by Google photos – my increasing arbiter of time – prompted me to delve beyond this thin sentiment and invited me to a reappraisal of this year, cleaved from the one gone by. What flickered up on my screen were photos of the first few occasions I’d been able to foray beyond the radius of my house to hover on the outside edge of two metres of my friends. These photos were accompanied by the tangle of emotions I’d felt at the time, but one emotion in particular stood out, as I realised upon reflection it had dissolved somewhere along the twelve months that have elapsed since. I found amidst the excitement and anticipation what I now recognise to be a dull weight of obligation. Spending physical, actual time with friends had become scarce, and I consequently carried within me this awareness which shaped itself into a pressure to have a ‘good time’. The can of hanging out became a should, became an allotment of time in which I sought to achieve a ‘good time’ through mental agendas or topics to cover.
As two metres has melted into government mandated bubbles, idleness has come creeping back into the time in the company of others. And this is what I’ve realised I’d missed: the free-form hanging out with friends that swallows its own memory whole. I can’t remember the specific contours of conversations in the interactions I’ve had since that obligation disappeared, and I’m almost glad I can’t. The shapelessness and idleness of hanging out aimlessly is refreshing and wonderful, and something I now feel the need to protect.
Clare Maunder
Lockdown has made so many of us homebodies, as we have stayed primarily inside, chatting with friends exclusively online and having all of our coffee from home, instead of from our favourite local caffeine supplier. That is one thing that has been such an easy convenience in so many of our lives that we realised we missed – going to a cafe with a friend, sitting there for hours, maybe reading a book or working on an assignment. It has always been a great place to escape to outside of our homes, and the pandemic changed that luxury for so many people. In fact, doing anything with friends was something I, and many others, always took for granted. A simple trip to the movies, sharing popcorn and snacks and sitting together in a row, occasionally chatting about the movie and getting a chorus of “shush” from everyone else trying to watch the movie.
Walking in the streets of Dublin wasn’t the same during the height of the pandemic – everything was quieter, there was less laughter and chattering, the usual bustle of the streets and view of people dining in the summer sun was gone. Everything has been different, even inside homes and apartments – the ease of going to friends’ places, sharing meals and taking public transport on the way home in the late evening, worry-free with no nerves about the many people around you also taking the bus or Luas on their way back home. It has been very easy to realise that the ability for friends and family to easily come together, whether going out or staying in, has been something many of us have missed as we realise how important it is for our mental health. With some of these simple but amazing parts of our lives coming back, it’s easier to appreciate them even more than before.
Julia Bochenek
Illustrations by Emily Stevenson
