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​Annabel Schuler has been a journalist for many decades. Now a writer she is based in Nelson where she is working on a biography and plumbing the depths of book publishing for the first time.

One concept we heard a lot during the Covid 19 lockdown in March 2020 was ‘juggling’.  This perfectly described my daughter who was juggling a work-from-home job, two lovely children with completely different learning styles, and a household where her husband is an essential worker.

Living 550 km away I felt for her and wracked my brains for a way to help. The only skills I could offer from a distance were those of a writer, sometimes tutor.  So, I made my trickiest pitch yet.

I suggested both children write a story with me then I would have the stories professionally published as a souvenir.  The trick was to find topics which interested and engaged them.   Miss 7 years old is bright and breezy, everything is effortless, but she knows what she wants to do and what not.  Mr 10 years old is a different lad.  He would rather be grounded from mountain biking for a month than do school work - especially writing. But I made the pitch, it was accepted, and I began the stories by writing the first few sentences.

We batted the stories back and forth by email with the children keeping the plot flowing through some rather incredible twists and turns. I added context and structure and there was some judicious editing.
But I needed to be careful.  These were the children’s stories not mine and to keep the contributions coming the stories had to feed their motivation.  Mr 10’s emerged, as predicted, as a ‘naughty’ story about injuries due to, yes mountain biking, and disobeying instructions from mum and dad.  It all ended with a minor accident in grandad’s truck.  Miss 7 was all about horse riding. Her story revolved around her passion and her friends. There were ponies named Rollo and Casper who offered endless rides.

The local printers did a great job and we have several smart looking A5 booklets to remind them of being locked down - but not out.

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​Sue is a poet, avid conservationist and a member of the Waiheke Volunteer Fire Brigade and has felt fortunate to live on an island with no Covid-19 cases.  Her friend’s, sister’s daughter endured Covid in quarantine, however, when she returned to Aotearoa.  Her ‘long-covid’ heart damage story touched Sue, particularly as she experienced a post-viral condition during the 1980s that deeply affected her life. Sue worries hugely about the, almost, invisible multitudes that will suffer ‘long-covid’ in the years ahead.
 
Your daughter’s heart
 
The Onetangi wave breathes   rises    breaks on the shore
then is gone as if it has never been there
 
we hear our heartbeats in
the breaking surf
 
seawater seeps into the sand
& the sand dries again
 
what wave it seems to ask
what wave?
 
I dream of a time we can say
what pandemic?
It’s gone as if it has never been here.
 
Yet we drink our tea & you
talk about
your daughter’s heart
 
how you both escape
Europe by the skin of your teeth
Covid hitchhiking
in your daughter’s body
like some demon.
 
The possession is a stone
on her chest over the heart
digging into that muscle
 
leaving its mark
the scar
a weakness.
 
You & I sip our knowledge
quietly
 
we’ll turn & turn in
Waikouaiti & Waiheke
listen to the sea breathe
out on our shoreline
while the pandemic’s ghost
stamps cloven hooves
shadows us.
 
© sue fitchett

​Abby Letteri is a writer based in Wellington and on the Kapiti Coast. Her first book, down they forgot: a memoir, was published in early 2021, between lockdowns.
 
During the first lockdown, I walked my dogs up the road most days to stretch their legs and clear away the cobwebs. We’d take a left out of the gate and follow the trees until the canopy gave way to sky, to where the road dips down to a one lane bridge, then up again into the narrowing of the Gorge. Just before we’d break free of the trees, we’d pass an old farm gate made of wood and covered with delicate mosses, set into the bush. It was one of those quiet gates that holds its tongue and tells no secrets.
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During the second week of lockdown, a basket appeared on a chunk of wood just outside the quiet gate. It was old, formed of two-toned wicker, brown and cream, with a braided handle, and filled to the brim with apples and walnuts. A hand-lettered sign told me to please help myself.
The apples were small but amazingly sweet and juicy. I ate one as I walked up the road and pocketed another for the old pony. This ritual became the new routine. I pocketed the occasional walnut, too, delighting in cracking it open after dinner and eating the sweet meats with a bit of cheese. There was something about the basket, the unencumbered offering, that made me feel more at home than I had in years.

On the fifth day, I left an offering in return: a perfect crimson leaf from my little maple tree. Another day, a small beach pebble in the shape of a heart. I placed these treasures in the bottom of the basket and felt a quickening of connection.

Towards the end of the second week of lockdown, the basket was gone. In its place was a note asking whoever had taken it to please return the basket. It wasn’t an angry note, it seemed to accept the possibility that the contents might have made a difference to a hungry household. But something about the theft got my hackles up. All the way to the swing bridge and back, past the reserve and the lone white horse in the big field, I kept turning it over in my mind. Someone had pulled over, snatched up the basket—and with it the day’s harvest of apples and walnuts—and taken off. Casual and callous, just like that.

The following morning, while rummaging in the shed, I spied a cheap woven basket festooned with thick cobwebs and surrounded by mouse droppings, its trim painted pale pink. I dusted it off, gave it a blast with the hose and set it outside in the sun to air. By the time the dogs and I were ready to walk, the basket was dry. I scribbled a note on a piece of card, and we headed up the road.
When we got to the quiet gate, the stump was still empty. I put the card on the stump and placed the pink basket on top. It was a poor substitute for the beautiful old brown hamper, but perhaps it would be a vessel good-enough for the harvest.

Up the Gorge, the white horse was grazing by the fence and whickered a soft greeting as we passed. I stopped to pluck him a handful of the long grass growing on the verge. By the swing bridge, we were overtaken by a mob of sheep followed by the farmer with his grinning dogs riding shotgun on a quad bike. Hens were out in the grassy paddock, scratching under trees, and the donkeys, Alice and Victor, lifted their heads and followed us with their intelligent eyes. A kingfisher, plump in his blue-green cloak and rosy waistcoat, perched on the quiet gate.

The animals reminded me how often I get it wrong with people, how much easier it is to communicate through an indirect exchange of apples and pebbles. Lockdown has its consolations. Heading home, I felt an indescribable lightness. It may have been joy.

Author bio: Rex McGregor is an Auckland playwright. His short comedies have been produced on four continents from New York and London to Sydney and Chennai. His most popular play, Threatened Panda Fights Back, has been produced over a dozen times. Website: http://www.rexmcgregor.com/
 
Tabby's Plague Diary
A perceptive cat notices changes in her home environment.

TABBY
Something’s up. The big one’s packed the cupboards with food. Much more than I can eat by myself. Hey, maybe she’s getting another cat. With any luck, it’ll be a tom. A live-in mate. That’ll save me from sneaking out at night.

Weeks later and still no joy on the feline companionship front. But the big one’s home a lot more. She’s packing cupboards again. This time, with piles of paper rolls. I remember having fun, unravelling one of those things when I was a kitten. The novelty soon wore off, though. Hey, maybe she knows something I don’t. Am I finally expecting?

No sign of the pitter-patter of tiny paws yet. But the house is bustling. Both the big one and the little one are here all day long. My saucer’s always full. And they keep my bowl topped up with tasty treats. Hey, I hope they aren’t fattening me for slaughter! Surely not. Then again, they are carnivores. When I play with a mouse, I enjoy lulling it into a false sense of security before swallowing it. Better be on my guard. 

Things are getting tense around here. The little one’s throwing tantrums and the big one can’t control her. Unless this is all just an act. To cover their evil designs on me. The big one’s started hiding her face behind a mask. But I still recognize her. She spends an excessive amount of time brewing a dark brown liquid. While she’s out of the kitchen, I’ll take a quick sip from her mug… Yuck! Bitter. There’s no way I’d drink enough of the poison for it to be fatal. I bet she’s refining the recipe to make it more palatable. Then she’ll spike my milk. After I’ve given birth, of course. So she can make a feast of my whole family!

I’ll never be a mother. I don’t have an estrous cycle. Something’s wrong with my reproductive organs. There can’t be a cure. The big one takes me to the vet regularly. I’m sure they’ve tried everything to help me conceive. Perhaps I’ve been unfair. Accusing them of seeking to harm me—when all this time they’ve been praying I’d become pregnant. That explains the extra nourishment, the toy paper rolls, even the little one’s tears. 

They both look miserable. Obviously heartbroken at my infertility. I’ll comfort them. Brush my fur against their legs. Tickle their cheeks with my whiskers. After all they’ve done for me, this is the least I can do.

Follow this link to a Zoom performance by Kira Hoag in Los Angeles: 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0RUpxHaEsyo&t

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Pat Backley is an author, based in Auckland. She is a mother to one beautiful daughter. Passionate about people and travelling the world, she has spent seventy years living a colourful and interesting life and her books reflect these passions.
 
When we were plunged into our first lockdown in March 2020, I wasn’t particularly concerned. I thought it was just another virus, like the SARS outbreak. It would make headlines worldwide, then pass by, leaving us almost untouched. This was merely a blip, a rather shocking halt to our normal everyday lives here in Aotearoa New Zealand. Surely it would be over in a couple of weeks, when I had a big overseas trip planned and then we could get back to normal?

How wrong I was.
 
Every year since I emigrated to NZ I’ve travelled back to London, to visit my beloved daughter, my only child. This time I was also going to see friends in France, Morocco, Spain and Russia.
 
Instead, I celebrated my 69th birthday alone, in isolation, in my bubble of one.
 
I spent the first few weeks of lockdown lazing on the sofa, watching Netflix and eating far too much chocolate. I tried to avoid the news. It was depressing seeing how badly the rest of the world was faring. But it was also addictive. I found myself watching every news bulletin, even though they often made me cry.
 
Thank God for the internet, for Zoom, WhatsApp and Facetime. I could talk to friends, post messages on Facebook and Instagram and see how other people were coping.
 
It was a novelty at first. Not having to make any effort to go out, wearing comfy clothes all day long, but then the novelty started to wear off. I began to miss things: a cup of proper barista coffee, lunch with friends, hugs. For me, human touch has been the thing I have missed most during this pandemic.
 
Despair began to set in. I was worried about my daughter in London, things were dire there. I worried about my friends, some of them were quite elderly and susceptible to this awful virus. I worried about my close friends in Fiji. How would they cope if the pandemic ravaged their country?
 
Living alone gives you too much time to think. I now knew that my planned trip to see my daughter wasn’t going to happen. The world was in a terrible mess, the situation worsening daily. It was like living in a science fiction movie.
 
I was 69 years old and realised I needed to do something. And so I decided to write a book. I had never written a book before. Like many people I had dreamt of doing so, but life always got in the way. I sat up day and night for two weeks, frantically putting all my thoughts on paper. My first novel was published six months later.
 
Although Auckland is in level 4 again and the future is uncertain, I feel more fortunate than most of the rest of the world.  My beloved daughter chose to come home permanently and is now only thirty minutes away. We live in an incredibly beautiful country, with great beaches and kind people. Every day I feel grateful to be able to call Aotearoa New Zealand my home.

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​Sandy Plummer has been a writer all her working life, but mostly a legal writer. She is quite new to memoir and the idea of writing about herself but is beginning to see some value in it, for herself, for her family and perhaps for a wider community, now and later.
 
Wednesday 18 August 2021 — Day 1 of Level 4 lockdown
When I was diagnosed with two cancers, in November and December 2020, I said that 2021 would be my lockdown year. I was thinking then that although other New Zealanders might be beginning to travel overseas again, my plans to travel, and celebrate a significant birthday, would definitely be postponed, as I had a full year of treatment lying ahead. I expected that 2021 would bring greater personal challenges for me than 2020.

As 2020 drew to a close it seemed that, as a country, we had pretty much dodged the virus. We felt lucky that mostly we had stayed safe and well and retained our freedoms, though confined within our own borders. Hopefully we were done with lockdowns and the first half of 2021 would see us all vaccinated. Throughout 2020 I’d been very concerned for family and friends in the UK and elsewhere overseas. They had all, thankfully, escaped Covid-19, but it had been a very tough year with the virus rampaging, case numbers and deaths out of control, hospitals overwhelmed.

We started the year in a good position, still Covid-19 free, but by 14 February 2021 Auckland was put into a snap level three lockdown. That same month the first group of 100 nurses were vaccinated but it transpired that vaccinating us all was going to take many months. I was vaccinated in June. My blood cancer and the chemotherapy I have been on decrease my immunity, so avoiding all infections is critical, not just Covid; any ill friend or a crowd of strangers are unwelcome.

From 1 March New Zealand was Covid-19 free but by early August the government had begun to say it would be ‘when’ not ‘if’ we have a Delta variant case in the community; eventually and inevitably our border controls would be breached. On Tuesday 17 August I visited the physiotherapist as part of my surgery rehab. She was talking about readying her business for another lockdown. Then I rushed off to meet my daughter, she had the day off after working Saturday in the hospital. I had bought tickets for a movie which I thought would be enforced, but enjoyable, rest time, for her and me, and it was. We sat in the lazyboy seats and ate our ice creams; there is something especially decadent about going to the movies on a weekday and in working hours. On leaving the theatre, discussing The Justice of Bunny King but also checking our phones, we learned a case had been found in the community and a lockdown was likely imminent, the Prime Minister would make an announcement at 6.30pm. We discussed going to the supermarket but had a cup of tea and a chat instead. I stopped for milk, fruit and vegetables on the way home as my fridge was pretty bare. There were around a dozen people filling our small local greengrocer when I arrived at about 5.30pm; we weren’t well-distanced. I wondered if shopping was a mistake, but one case and in Devonport, 25km away, I shouldn’t worry. I wanted bananas, there were none, I wanted broccoli, there was none. I took just one bottle of milk as there weren’t many left. The staff were restocking shelves where they could and reassuring everyone that they would be open tomorrow with more stock.

The Prime Minister’s announcement came. We learned we were to be in full (level 4) lockdown, just like March 2020, from midnight. The impact was nothing like the shock and disbelief of her first lockdown announcement in March 2020 but still it was sudden and would take some adjusting to.

On Wednesday morning I learned that a nurse at Auckland Hospital was one of the handful of cases discovered so far and that the hospital was ‘locking down’. I thought my hospital appointment would be postponed. I also thought I wouldn’t mind a break in nine months to date of constant tests, treatments and multiple medical and related appointments. I didn’t rush to shower and dress. At the same time I was concerned about my daughter who works across several wards at Auckland hospital.
By 10.00am I’d received a call to say my appointment was on, I was to see the haematologist and collect from the hospital pharmacy my week’s supply of growth factor injections preparatory to my stem cell collection. The collection would proceed next week as planned. What a relief, that whilst everyone but essential workers stayed home, my treatment would continue. But did I really want to attend a hospital in lockdown?

Postscript 6/9/21
Over 24-26 August and in level 4, the three-day stem cell collection took place and was successful. My cells will be frozen and returned to me, later this year, following powerful chemotherapy, and when, subject to bed and nurse availability, I rise to the top of the waiting list.

My daughter and partner completed fourteen days of isolation, entirely confined to their flat, having visited, briefly, while masked, a ‘location of interest’ shortly after the movie on 17 August.

My brother-in-law, in the UK, was laid low in bed with Covid the week of my stem cell collection but is now recovering, slowly. He and my sister had been double-vaccinated and were incredibly careful, but the incidence of Covid-19 in the UK remains high.

I was back at the hospital again today for my weekly chemotherapy injection. I didn’t want to go. Patients and medical staff were nervous already, understandably; and now an in-patient presenting with unusual symptoms that were not initially flagged had since tested Covid positive at Middlemore Hospital yesterday.

Hospitals are essential but not entirely safe places to be at this time. Although I have severely compromised immunity, I continue to interact weekly, if not daily, with the healthcare community, with staff and patients, despite Delta still being amongst us. I am pressured to carry on by the unspoken opinion of the professionals caring for me that the alternative, to pause or delay treatment, to stand still, is riskier.

​Tony Eyre, with his wife, Yvonne Fogarty, live in the harbour suburb of Vauxhall, Dunedin. They have four adult children and five grandchildren. Tony has been a chartered accountant in public practice for over 50 years and is also a writer specialising in creative non-fiction. He is currently working on a bibliomemoir, an account of his life as a book collector.

From our upstairs bedroom window, I have delighted in a hundred-year-old kōwhai in full bloom. It’s a busy tree on some mornings. A pair of melodic tūī do their usual breakfast ritual of feeding on its kōwhai flowers. A lone kererū perches statuesque in undistracted contemplation, and an unexpected swarm of tiny silvereye suddenly emerge from the golden blossom and dart off on their tree-to-tree circuit routine. Beyond this miracle of nature is the layered vista of the calm Otago Harbour, the inner-city high-rises and hillside suburbs and, depending on the weather, a blue or gray sky.

In pre-Covid times, this annual spring extravaganza of sun-infused fiery gold always seemed to last just a few short days before its blossom faded into a pale-yellow insignificance. But Covid lockdown has shown me different. With time to be still, rather than the usual day-to-day busyness of workday routine outside the home, I’ve continued this past two weeks to be spellbound by the performance of this magnificent old kōwhai, silhouetted on the skyline.

For three days of the week during the alert level lockdowns, my downstairs library reluctantly converts into a home office where I work with remote access as a chartered accountant, unable to operate from my 6th-floor business premises in the city. My floor is littered with client files; my communications with my partners, staff and clients is by phone and email; scanner and printer technology, reliant on home Wi-Fi, is not as reliable and efficient, and on one hair-pulling day my remote access software crashes out every four minutes. A midday walk along the harbourside with my wife Yvonne provides some sanity and a much-needed break from my sedentary home office routine.

Thankfully, on non-workdays, my office files are tidily stacked into a corner and my library transforms back into a warm calming place where I like to spend time reading and writing and to be encircled with books, like they are old friends, revisiting them often with affection. Naturally, it’s my favourite room in the house, further enhanced with vintage writing desk and leather and bentwood library chairs — and the subtle smell of books. A place to be still, whether in Covid lockdown or not.

​Janine is a scholar and writer in Aotearoa New Zealand, who has always been fascinated by the stories of others and builds this passion into her research and writing. During lockdowns, she lives in her family bubble with a pack of furry babies and gets creative. She’s an avid crafter who loves trying anything new (at least once!).
 
There is an ominous shadow inside our gilded Covid cage. I call him Ed. He’s growing bold again.
I’m prone to dramatic overtures, as my friends will confess, but I’m not being dramatic in this moment. Neither about the cage, nor about Ed. Our little bubble of three joined lockdown with dogged determination last Tuesday.We’ve learnt from the past not to panic buy, that the shops stay open for at least one of us to escape for a moment each week, and we all (pups included) relish a daily neighbourhood walk, sometimes two.

Our bubble wholeheartedly supports the public health initiative to stay home. We can find happiness hiding away from (or protecting others from?) the tyranny of the Delta strain. But making the close contact list is a whole new Covid experience. Locked. Down. Inside our gilded cage. With Ed. It’s a comfortable cage, a privileged one, filled with resources to see us through. But a locked cage nonetheless. For the most part we have coped remarkably well. I’ve certainly never been happier to drive for my Covid test and see the world once more even when its masked or observed from my mobile bubble.

But you see, there’s Ed.

Over years and tears we have wrestled with Ed in our home. He arrived in our daughter’s back pocket quietly one dark night. To my shame and regret, I didn’t even notice him living with us until much later. She was feeding her shadow quietly in the corners, keeping him hidden away from us by her own despair and inner confusion. I only noticed Ed when I stumbled into her room unannounced one night and saw the ravages of Ed’s appetite. You see, to feed Ed, for him to grow, she must get smaller, her body physically shrinks, her light diminishes.
 
Then we fought. And we fought hard. I begged Ed to leave her alone, I begged her to kick him out. And we watched her shrink, fading smaller and smaller, while Ed the shadow grew. The light in our home was slowly being overtaken by his arrogant confidence that he was stronger than her, bigger than all of us. But Ed doesn’t know my girl the way I do. On the ropes, in the final round, she started fighting back. We consider ourselves deeply blessed that we could access and find a medical team, including an eating disorder specialist who helped her finally confront Ed, see him for what he is. It’s not a matter of if, they said, but when he wins then his shadow will eclipse the last corner of your light.

Then she fought. And she fought hard. Years later, she exists in a healthier state. I give thanks every day that she is thriving in a carefully managed state of recovering. For type As like ourselves the idea of recovering as a perpetual state, rather than recovered as a completed task has been a lot to process. It’s a journey, of mental, physical and emotional agility. Ed has been contained in a corner, kept in his place for the most part, although occasionally he gets a little cocky and tries to push the limits again.
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And then Covid came along and Ed’s arrogance grew alarmingly. I could see at the announcement of our first ever lockdown how she panicked. I was even more panicked when I saw her reach out, back towards him. No, I screamed on the inside, he’s not your comfort, don’t give him room to grow! It was a daily challenge, and we were constantly checking on Ed to make sure she was still able to keep him at bay, not letting his shadow overwhelm her again.

This past week of lockdown has been different. Locked in self-isolation, no one leaving the house, the vital outdoors, the fresh sunlight that we need to restrain Ed was harder to manage. All her coping strategies were severely limited, her anxieties heightened. Ed was growing bolder. A late night ping from a text and a negative result equals a positive outcome. A light switches on, Ed slinks back into place. Yet never fully evicted. So we sit inside our gilded cage as lockdown marches on, keeping a close eye on our ominous shadow. She’s won this round. But I worry, with a mother’s broken heart, about all the other shadows being fought or succumbed to all around our motu right now.