ELSPETH WHITE, 15

Dear whoever wants to read, Is it just me, or does lockdown have a smell? For me it’s the smell of a very specifc soap or the smell of paninis cooking on the Foreman grill (a welcome change from school lunches). I know it’s cheesy, but it’s really true: when I use that soap or eat that panini, I swear I am transported back just for a minute. Te thing is – and I feel guilty every time I confess this – I feel nostalgic for lockdown. I know it was terrible in some ways, and I know we’re not really out of it yet, but, if I’m honest, lockdown kind of showed me how I want to live! Wow that sounds depressing: being isolated and unable to even go to restaurants, but there are so many things I wouldn’t change. Online school, for example, has taught me self-study suits me! Apparently I thrive of silence (or the gentle hum of trafc from the dual carriageway) and independence. Also, as sad as this sounds, I think I thrive of only seeing a select few people (on Zoom calls, etc) a couple of times a week. I am defnitely exposing my introversion here.

Perhaps time has slightly warped my positivity about isolation here. In the frst couple of weeks in September, seeing friends and teachers was invigorating and genuinely helpful. It’s still great now; it’s just sometimes I crave my desk: my escape.

I speak from a privileged position, in that no one I love has had the virus, but, in retrospect, I liked – dare I say loved – lockdown! My motivation was, for the most part, high (thanks to Joe Wicks) and my lockdown routine solidifed pretty quickly. Five school lessons a day, insert breaks with piano in the morning, Disney movies at lunch with the odd Zoom call, and you have a genuinely happy Elspeth! You know, all the days in lockdown have sort of blurred into one, but a day I can remember very specifcally is the frst Sunday of lockdown. We’d just been on a walk (which is a remarkable jumpstart for my imagination) and once we were home I found my empty, beautiful notebook and began to write. Tere’s something magical about writing for me. It removes you from time and space for a couple of hours and builds an entire universe out of strings of letters. A pretentious way of saying it, but there you go. Te point is, lockdown fuelled a passion I never would have discovered otherwise, and for that, I am forever grateful. Another passion that lockdown introduced to me was the wonderful world of cinema. I reckon, as a family, we watched flms fve out of seven days a week. We watched some classics like Te Truman Show, some underrated gems like About a Boy, and some questionable flms too (cough, cough, Dodgeball). I loved every minute of it.

I think the truth is, the positive things stick with me rather than the negatives (which is great!), but at the same time, it kinda makes lockdown feel fctional. I don’t think 2020 is going to sink in for a while to be honest. Tank you for reading my random stream of thoughts, Elspeth