With the mask mandates now finally dropped here in South Africa, the whole Covid-19 saga has for Chantelle and I receded to a point where that whole period of craziness now seems like distant bad dream. Of course, we went through the same emotional stages as everyone, the initial panic and heightened sense of worry, the insane level of cleaning and sanitizing, the constant checking of the infection and death numbers across the globe, the initial discomfort of the mandated mask wearing, the extreme frustrations of the hard lockdowns, and then the eventual acceptance of the new order, but as it stands, we walked through and emerged from the whole saga pretty much… unscathed.

Chantelle’s little baking business took a bit of a knock during the hard lockdowns, but I continued my work on Kinetica for Touchwork as per the norm, so we weren’t really affected financially. We both already work from home so there was no change there, other than having the girls not go to school every second day which meant a bit more homeschooling from our side. Other than a close work associate who passed early on, we didn’t actually lose anyone in our family or friend circles to the disease itself, and as far as we know, none of us living here in Country Mews actually caught the virus either.

That said, despite the relatively easy ride through the storm that we fortunately had, I do remember with fondness that sense of immense joy when the vaccinations first got announced, and then that incredibly overwhelming sense of relief when Chantelle and I finally reached our age group’s turn to receive the vaccine itself.

So for the record, all vaccination visits administered at the very efficient government run Charles Morkel Stadium vaccination site in Strand, and we did of course celebrate all shots with an immediate breakfast treat after!

Of course, that’s not to say the pandemic isn’t still ongoing, but at least now we are all much better equipped to deal with it and can pretty much relegate it to the background of our lives. I must say though, as a Xennial I am getting more than just a little tired of living through so many of these ‘once in a lifetime’ global events!

Related Link: Covid-19 | Charles Morkel Stadium | Strand