Well, what a time we are living in.
Very few of us have ever experienced anything like the times we are living in right now. The current crisis has placed limits on all of us, on our freedom, our opportunity to live, work and learn in the ways we have become accustomed to.
If I'm honest, Friday was a low point for me. I collected the children from school, and as I sat on one of the benches in the playground, I felt unbearably sad. I watched friends bid each other farewell for the foreseeable, with tears in their eyes. I saw children running around the field, to enjoy the last precious moments of freedom with their friends. I saw teaching staff, with tears in their eyes, as they finally succumbed to the sadness they'd been stoically hiding all day, for the sake of the children.
What I've seen since though, is the resilience of my own children, and the inventiveness of the families that we know, but can no longer meet in person. Video calls have become the norm, even morphing into a game of virtual hide and seek!
And what it's taught all of us, I think, is not to take the value of those friendships, that time spent together, for granted. I hope that is the lasting legacy of these testing times.
In the meantime, I've been looking around me at home...what are the things that can lift us at this time? How do we find ways to make our hearts happy again?
We are fortunate here to have a garden which encourages wildlife to come in, and that is the kind of thing that can help us escape, even for a few moments. Nature, wildlife, the seasons don't know or care too much about what's going on right now. And if you can find 10 mins to stop, and take in what's around us, we can breathe for a moment. We can remember that, this too will pass, and when we come out the other side, the small things - whether that's our children, or the short moments we take to take in our surroundings - will be something we appreciate more than ever.
