Just keep swimming.

Today I am scared and sad. A week of home and nothing else and suddenly it all feels quite a lot. I am still getting up, having coffee, watercolour painting, reading, writing, cooking. But I can't even hug my sister because she's quarantined in another part of the house (the old playroom, not the East Wing of our mansion). I haven't hugged her since I left for South East Asia two months ago and I can see her through the window doing yoga in the garden and it's making me want to cry.

I miss a lot of people. I miss my boyfriend. I miss my friends who I haven't seen for months. I am craving sitting in one of their beds with a cup of tea, catching up on each other's lives. I think the entire nation is dreaming of going to the pub with their mates. Little did I think I'd miss bumping into anyone in the local towns.

I am avoiding the news but I know what it's saying. Doom, gloom, death, doom and gloom. Can you imagine if we reported deaths for the other illnesses that kill in high numbers the same way we are reporting this? Perhaps it is a way of getting the public to take these measures seriously. Perhaps. It just makes me feel scared and sad.

And I am lucky. I am safe in my lovely home with my loving family. We can go for walks in the beautiful fields just outside our door. My mum takes great pride in the garden and it brings a lot of joy.

I am, on most days, doing pretty well and staying pretty positive. I just wanted to share how I felt on this gloomy Monday, because I think nearly all of us are feeling the same. And it's okay, to feel scared and sad, because God knows this time is so uncertain.

I keep thinking of that bit in Finding Nemo when Dory is swimming into the depths of the ocean and she's scared so she sings a little song, "just keep swimming, just keep swimming". It's actually quite helpful. "Just keep swimming". We'll get past this dark and scary bit eventually.