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The Independent UK
The Independent UK
Lauren O'Neill

The Covid-19 lockdowns changed everything about our lives – so why do we insist on forgetting them?

Half a decade on, what have been the lasting effects of lockdown and the pandemic? - (Getty)

I don’t think I’m alone in the fact that I don’t really like to dwell on lockdown too much. It was, after all, a complicated, sad time, and when I do think about it, in my head it’s a weird blur of badly run laps around my local park, Google Hangouts, and endless Netflix. I was fortunate enough that in my own immediate life, nothing very bad happened, but it’s just as true that nothing very good happened either.

Now, to look back on, it just feels like empty time – time that could have been filled by untold experiences, had the world been going around as usual. For some people, though, the impact was world-shaking: perhaps it was a period when long Covid changed everything, or time they could have spent with loved ones that they’ll now never see again. No wonder it’s not really a place our brains like to go to.

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