Being an accounting of the recent and continuing pandemic and its various circumstances, from the perspective of an inhabitant of the regions lately called the Lost Quarter. Dates unknown.

Day Three Hundred Eighty Five

These past weeks walking about on the streets there has been a jarring sense of normality to many of the scenes. Restaurants and bars have been crowded and people have been gathering despite the quarantine protocols remaining in place. There has been a sense, nearly everywhere you look, that people are just done with the restrictions, with our shadowed, rule bound, existence, despite the fact that the grippe reborn remains as dangerous as ever.

With the rise in truancy from the rules there has been a rise in cases, with the result that we have returned to the place we were back in November. Our hospitals are not yet overwhelmed, but the numbers are rising. The only solace is that with the inoculations tricking out we have protected those most vulnerable to the dread lords depredations and so this wave of destruction has not resulted in as much death as the previous ones. But with so many falling to the dread lord’s touch there shall inevitably be more death.

In the fall, during the previous rising tide, there was a growing sense of dread and a knowledge that something would have to be done. When stricter protocols were put in place most people followed them. The moment seemed to demand them. Now is different though. Our salvation is at hand, but it is not here. The inoculations are coming, but at what seems a trickling pace. Elsewhere we hear stories of incredible numbers being dosed and we look at our meagre few and wonder why we have been left behind. It was fine to be patient and wait when numbers were dwindling, to imagine the summer to come, but when numbers are rising there is a renewed urgency.

People are desperate. They are tired of just hanging on, of all the rules and restrictions, necessary as they may be. Everyone is so tired of everything. We are all reduced to squalling children unable to articulate why we are angry. We are only looking for a target to direct that anger, be it the government, those who support the greater protocols, those who ignore them, those who have been inoculated and those who will refuse to be.

Today word came that the government is restoring some of the restrictions. There will be those who say it is not enough and those who say it is too much. They will shout at each other while the rest of us settle down to waiting some more. 385 days and counting with the grippe reborn. It seems impossible that it has been that long and yet it also seems as if it must have been so much longer.

Even as I write this, I receive word that my parents have their first doses. A glimmer of sunshine on a gloomy day. Two weeks and they will be able to go about their lives with some measure of security. I long for that day and I will choose to hope it will be soon.