We have all been living in our very comfortable, spacious safe bubble for the last two years. Depending how you look at the upcoming border opening, we are about to regain our freedom and be able to travel again, or we are going to burst that bubble completely and let COVID into our State. I am very conflicted, as I know how privileged we have been and the nearly normal life we’ve been living, however we’ve been separated from friends, family and the rest of both Australia and the world for a very long time.
Yes, I am apprehensive, but also excited. It does feel as if we will be rejoining the world again, with all the trials and tribulations that will bring. The wave of Omicron on it’s way will be our rather brusque baptism into the reality that the rest of the world has had to deal wth for two yeras.
Below some photographs from Friday evening, when we went out for a lovely seafood platter on the beach, and we did reflect on how lucky we have been to shelter here in or little corner of WA for two tumultuous years. Now, we are starting to adjust and with a few cases of Omicron in the community, everything is getting real.
It’s been, and will continue to be, challenging with such different viewpoints around opening the borders, the severity of COVID, vaccinations or anti-vaccination, quarantine or ‘let it rip’, all the different options. Here in WA there is a small but vociferous anti-tax movement, a combination of anti-pharma wellness ideology and anti-mandate.
I think this will have had a huge polarising effect on so many people and I hope that the difference can be resolved.
The MS
As I’d always hoped, this blog has become far less about the MS and more about life, travelling, study, work, the various paths upon which we all travel. However, the MS is still very much with me. Yesterday, we went to the museum in Perth for the day, then a bit of shopping, after I’d kayaked in the morning. I was fine, but with some tingling in my toes I suspect from walking in my sandals for hours. Today I was fine, but had a very quiet day after my morning swim, and felt this was a necessary reminder that I am still impacted.
The other side of that reminder … I swam 1500m in the sea, which is the furthest I think I have ever swum in one go. I’ve been training up steadily to this distance, so it didn’t feel too hard, watching shoals of little fish swimming past me was a lovely moment. The Jetty to Jetty swim in a few weeks is seeming possible at the moment.
My Longest Journey 