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Collected Item: “HIST30060 Lockdown #1: Activities and Alcohol”

Give your story a title.

HIST30060 Lockdown #1: Activities and Alcohol

What sort of object is this: text story, photograph, video, audio interview, screenshot, drawing, meme, etc.?

Photographs

Tell us a story; share your experience. Describe what the object or story you've uploaded says about the pandemic, and/or why what you've submitted is important to you.

On 31 March 2022, the first lockdown was initiated in both Melbourne and Sydney. I was in Sydney at the time, having arrived a few days prior from Melbourne as border restrictions were starting to be introduced. I am slightly ashamed to say, now, that I really enjoyed this first lockdown. I hadn't lived at home since 2018, and it was a unique experience to enjoy time together that wouldn't have normally happened. We've always been pretty close, but the lockdown forced an intimacy that we'd never had before (it helped that my teenage brother was required to be at home and boredom had driven him to start having conversations with us again). I think mum and dad were consciously trying to keep lockdown interesting, and soon a weekly cocktail night (with a required lounge formal dress code), bi-weekly painting lessons via zoom and daily yoga with mum, nightly music sessions with dad, lego competitions with the old dusty lego sets, and weekend family walks were introduced. I had never done so much exercise in my life, and yet I had never consumed as much alcohol, either. Even when I lived in a flatshare as an eighteen-year-old. Alcohol quickly became a problem for me, one that I have yet to fully address although I have started to cut down. The taste of wine became associated with fun times with the people I loved, so of course, I loved it. And when the lockdown eventually lifted, I returned to Melbourne nearly friendless (having left before I got the chance to settle in and with little opportunity to meet new people), a cheap bottle of pinot grigio and I became good - if slightly toxic - friends.

Use one-word hashtags (separated by commas) to describe your story. For example: Where did it originate? How does this object make you feel? How does this object relate to the pandemic?

FirstLockdown, Family, Cocktails, Wine, Painting, Yoga, Music, Lego, Hiking, Love

Who originally created this object? (If you created this object, such as photo, then put "self" here.)

self

Give this story a date.

2020-03-31
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