Working from home, locked away from the judging eyes of society, means living as if no one is looking. We are free to let loose and be ourselves. Is that a good thing? Because from the looks of some of us, ourselves is not a very pleasant sight. Look at you, for example. You’re a mess. You look like leftovers. You look like unwashed dishes. And your behaviour? Just because there is no one around to make you feel ashamed, you have become shameless. Let’s not be too quick to judge, though. Maybe it hasn’t been that bad. Let’s run down a checklist and see. Talking to yourself: That’s okay. It is a normal coping mechanism in times of isolation and stress. “There are a lot of birds in this neighbourhood,” you say. “I wish I was a witch. Yeah. Then I could change into a bird and fly around, just to escape this boredom without endangering the lives of others because birds don’t spread COVID-19. Not a bat, just a bird. I would fly to Kwizera’s house and poop on his verandah. That guy stole my forms from the photocopier at work and then lockdown started before I could get my revenge.” This type of talking to yourself is good for your mental health in times like this. However, if you find yourself uttering these phrases, you have gone too far. Watch out for the following: “I dare you to look me in the eye and say that to my face!” “I don’t think this is working. It’s not you, it’s me, but I think we need to see other people.” And “Shut up!” If you say any one or more of those, please stop talking to yourself. You are going crazy. Talk to the furniture instead. Talking to yourself while on lockdown with family is different, though. You should talk to them instead. They never listen to you anyway? That is not a problem. Pretend it is one of those office meetings you thought you hated but which you miss so much right now. No one listened to anyone in those meetings, remember? Talk to your family as if you are in a meeting. “I need us to mainline strategy outside the box, guys. What we need is to in-source co-synergistic solutions, you get me? Feel free to input your thoughts.” This is only slightly less insane when you say it to your one-year-old baby than it is when Prosper from marketing says it in staff meetings. Hygiene and style I am sure you have been taking a shower daily. After all, we are washing our hands eight times a day; why not wash the rest? I am sure you are hygienic, but how much? Do you still remember where the deodorant is or have you spent the whole of April smelling of Dettol, sanitiser and alcohol? There used to be a thing called lotion. You used to put it on your body. It was like a form of clothing but for smearing on, not wearing. Remember that? Of course not. The exception is those who do video conference calls by Zoom. They make the effort to at least make their upper half look presentable. But according to statistics that I am fabricating, from the waist downwards, 57 per cent of them are wearing the same clothes they slept in, 35 per cent are not even wearing underwear and 0 per cent, i.e. not a single one, has put on a single sock on a single toe since lockdown began. The rest? Look at you. You look like the rubbish that rubbish threw away. You look like what the cat would drag back out. Singing along and entertain In the good old days, like February, we would sing absently along to our favourite songs as we went about our work. Typically, we do it under our breath and only for brief moments in the loo, in the corridor, or in the car. But something changed with lockdown. Now we feel that humming tunes quietly is too weak and dilute — your soul needs to roar for its freedom! You now know why the caged bird sings! It is in the African spirit to sing out loud in times of hardship. You need to sing at the top of your voice! However, you should remember that you are not Beyoncé. In one song of hers called Listen, she performs what my researcher tells me is a “G sharp major soprano” or something (I didn’t actually write it down because she said it during a Zoom meeting and we got distracted. A fly landed on her laptop camera, which started a conversation about whether her house was clean or not. That became an argument about whether Fidelis even had the right to ask her that when, according to Angel, she could smell his unbrushed teeth across the Wi-Fi. Then a cockroach passed over Angel’s and in the whole ruckus I forgot the actual terminology), but the short of it is, there are notes Beyoncé sings that are too high for us average non-Beyoncé’s. There are reasons why she called that song Listen, and didn’t call it Go Ahead and Sing With Me. But if it is Drake, Jidenna or Lucky Dube, then please, go all out. Mime playing the guitar, the drums and the saxophone and be the whole band. Be the queen dancer as well and twerk at all appropriate moments. It is crazy to sing and dance when you think no one is watching, but it is the good kind of crazy. If you don’t know the words, just sing whatever comes into your head anyway. You can make up lyrics for Utawezana. But if you find yourself singing made-up lyrics to Bob Marley you need to stop, see the error of your ways, go to Google, learn the correct words. We need to maintain some standards.
