Maybe Gen X wasn’t made for this

In September 2021, which feels like three lifetimes ago, I pondered via HouseGoesHome where we would all be in 12 months time and how we would look back on the tumult of 2021.

I noted that I was pretty glad I got through the pandemic as a Gen X. I thought this meme was pretty funny …

But I am not feeling very Karen Walker right now.

September 2021 seems pretty chill compared to everything that’s happened since December. The kids actually told me last night that they quite fancied a week in isolation as enforced rest. Shhhhh. Knock on wood.

In the six months since September, Omicron appeared from nowhere and suddenly NSW was battling 60,000 cases a day; I decided to complicate my life by getting COVID in Fiji rather than Australia; Russian invaded Ukraine; half of NSW got swept away by flood waters; Shane Warne died at age 52; and now people are keeling over from Japanese encephalitis.

Apparently COVID-19 cases in NSW could double within weeks as a sub-variant of the Omicron strain sweeps across the state, according to new data.

The forecasted rise in cases comes after NSW recorded 16,288 new cases yesterday, marking a significant increase from the 8782 daily cases recorded on Sunday.

Generation X – people born between 1965 and 1979 – are meant to be better equipped than other age groups for this sort of thing.

We’re supposed to be very self-reliant because we were the first generation that experienced both parents working outside the home.

Many members of Generation X were the infamous ‘latch key kids’, who stayed home by themselves after school until their parents returned from work. Society hadn’t quite worked out the finer details of after-school care yet.

We’re the resilient ‘survivors’ who, while cynical, pessimistic, and suspicious, have pretty successful at negotiating the challenges of the pandemic.

But I’m beginning to lose my Gen X steely resolve.

I am trying to stay positive. I’m heading to the chemist this afternoon to finally get my third vaccination jab so I can potentially travel.

I’d been putting it off because I was so gun shy after experiencing 50 days of COVID fatigue, but I was running out of convenient times to do it this month. Quite a few friends have been knocked for a six by the third jab, so I thought I’d better have mine on a Friday when my Saturday was free for bed rest.

Wouldn’t want to be crook for the festival of my 54th birthday … which has been screwed around for two years in a row by the pandemic.

COVID is springing up all around me again, with cases among people I’ve been socialising alongside. Eeeeek.

But I figure I might as well party while my health holds, as who know what else 2022 has in store for us. Stay tuned for the celebrations.

Take care and I’ll catch you next week.

Song of the day: U2 “Numb”