Lockdown hasn’t changed me – I’m still the poster girl for underachievers everywhere

At first I bought jigsaw puzzles and learned to knit, imagining lockdown would turn me into a woman from a Jane Austen novel, content to sit and sew quietly to pass the time. As if...

We have been in lockdown for just over a month and I’ve now learned that I am the exact same person in lockdown as I am when not. I love to start things, am useless at sticking with them and usually give up after a couple of tries and return to my long-held habit of sitting on the sofa, eating chocolate and watching TV.

When not in lockdown, I’m awful for signing up to the introductory offer of a new exercise class, making it to the first session, undergoing some form of energetic epiphany as I swear loyalty to the new programme, only to wake up the next day in paralysing agony as my underworked muscles seize up and remind me that, no, I will never bloody well do that again. I buy theatre tickets to a play, adore it, rave about it to anyone who’ll listen and, once again, pledge my dedication to supporting the arts as much as possible, only to not think of buying tickets again for another 18 months.

So it’s probably not surprising that when lockdown looked likely, I bought myself a few jigsaws and even “learn to knit” and “learn to needlepoint” kits due to some idiotic romantic notion that lockdown would turn me into a woman from a Jane Austen novel, content to sit and sew quietly to pass the time. To quote the illustrious Cher Horowitz (from Clueless), as if.

To begin with, in that first flush of self-belief, I managed one jigsaw (where every single piece differed from the others) and so finished it off in an afternoon. The others are just massive collections of the same colour, so after connecting maybe three pieces, I got angry I hadn’t finished yet, bored by the difficulty, and so gave up.

Next, I learned how to hold the knitting needles, to cast on, knit one, purl one and even managed a few rows before I realised I was dropping stitches all over the place and I was actually really stressed from the concentration. The instructions advised there were video tutorials available online, but I was so busy simultaneously watching The Wire for the second time that that simply wasn’t an option. And while the ball of wool and needles were shoved back into the box – the needlepoint never even made it out.

As I appear to have completely lost the ability to watch television without playing a game on my phone or mindlessly scrolling through Instagram, I figured why not use the time more productively? I decided to dust off my neglected Spanish using an app. After two or three sessions of “hombre” vs “mujer”, frustrated at the repetitiveness (and myself for selecting “beginner” when I have a degree in Spanish – and apparently, very little self-belief), I decided that learning was just too much doing for me.

Having reviewed my findings from this inadvertent social experiment, I learned that I divide my time in two: working and not working. When working, I sit and stare at a computer screen for the vast majority of the day, so when not working, I avoid any more computer screens. That means the novel/screenplay/inspired piece of literary fiction in any form won’t be getting written any time soon, then.

When not working, however, I can handle both phone and TV screens – as mentioned previously, usually at the same time. But preferably only when engaged in activities that do not serve to expand my mind, instead only to quiet it.

Thus far, four weeks into the “current normal”, I am fully committed to becoming a poster girl for the underachievers among us. Those of us who have neither the time nor the inclination to learn a new language (or remember one they’ve already learned), to get that six-pack or to do whatever the hell it is you need to do for just one loaf of sourdough bread.

Right now, it’s not about showing discipline to get your side hustle off the ground (here’s looking at you, Jonathan Shalit), it’s about getting through this weird and difficult time as best as we can manage. For some of us, it’s the endorphin release from running for an hour, for some it’s the sense of calm from meditation. For me, it’s availing of discounted Easter eggs while I can and re-reading Jilly Cooper.