#Microblog Monday 295: Empty Spaces
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The Daily Mail has a series of photos with a slider. If you move the slider in one direction, you see how the British town looks during tourist season. If you move the slider in the opposite direction, you see how it looks today, during the pandemic.
Of course, it’s not just the UK. This is the scene everywhere. But the pictures are eerie, and I can’t stop toggling the slider back and forth, watching the people disappear and then pop back up again.
A hotel called us last week and canceled our birdwatching trip. They offered to move the reservation, but we have no clue when to set a new trip. And it’s not as if the birds will stick around and wait for the tourists to return.
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9 comments
Yes, it is all a bit eerie. The absence of ferries on the harbour, and planes overhead are noticeable to me. Everyone is commenting here that the birds are returning to the towns and cities in lockdown. A rare native falcon was seen on one of our main streets last week! So other than exploring a little, I’m sure the birds will be there when you are able to go.
I wish it were eerie here. I live in the land of “you can’t tell me what to do!” so there’s only a small difference in the number of people out and about. :/ And there are tons of people outside in my neighborhood where I have never seen people before.
Bird: Hey where are the spectators? I’m not sitting here flapping my wings for nobody. Where my peeps at?
Bird2: I hear there was some kind of sickness or something.
Bird: Tell me it’s not bird flu again. I hate that. Gives us a bad name.
Bird2: Nothing like that. Maybe something batty. I wasn’t really paying attention.
Bird: So what should we do?
Bird2: I dunno. Just hang out until they come back, I guess. You wanna get a beer?
Bird: Yeah. Let’s go hit a beer feeder. Then we’ll come back.
Sorry your bird-watching trip got canceled. That’s a bummer.
I go back and forth between wanting things to open back up so that I can get back to some semblance of normalcy and fear that things will be reopened too soon and I will catch this virus. (I’m high risk for complications if I get it, so I’m scared of that.)
We live about a 20 minute drive from the airport in Toronto, and there are often planes flying overhead… noticeably fewer these days, though!
Our condo building faces onto a main highway/road (our unit faces the back — much quieter!) & it’s usually very busy with lots of traffic during the day. We’ve been out for a few walks, & there are still cars, but nowhere near what there normally is.
That’s wicked hypnotic, Mel. And I think eerie isn’t an eerie enough word for it…so much of this situation hurts my brain.
Our son’s dentist called a couple weeks back to reschedule his May 1st appointment. When I called them back and told them he preferred to cancel & rebook, the receptionist started to give me a spiel about how it was his second cancellation in a calendar year, and a third would mean they wouldn’t take him at the practice any more. She caught herself mid-lecture and switched to, “try to reschedule asap as we’re booking up fast.” It’s hard for me to be truly annoyed with her though, because I can only imagine what a nightmare it is for anyone in scheduling…
The air is actually pretty good where I live but even so the local area district is saying that our air quality hasn’t been this good in decades. Really makes you think.
Our kids were supposed to go to the dentist in late March. Shortly after the shelter in place order in mid-March, they called to reschedule to late April. Then of course they’ve called since then and basically just canceled the appointment until further notice.
I can’t believe that people are even talking about opening things back up at this point. I frankly am doubting that schools open this August. Until there is extremely widespread testing or a vaccine I don’t see it happening.
Yes, the air is so much cleaner where I live, and the sky is a shade of awe-inspiring blue. The birds are returning and the flora is blooming too, in the absence of all the pollution we create.
Yes, Mother Nature is finally breathing. But at what cost? When all this is behind us, we will once again go back to our destructive ways and abuse the earth again. Sigh! Or who knows we would have learned a lesson or two. Fingers crossed.
So strange, now things were a short time ago and how they are now for the foreseeable future.
I’m sorry about your birdwatching trip 🙁
Lol, Marci.