Workin' durin' lockdown was not stress free, but it was good to have a purpose and a reason to go out. At the same time, it was good to also have the time to enjoy the sunniest spring ever.

So my contribution to The Workers Story Project has taken a sharp turn from writing about my COVID-19 experience as a lay trade union official representing firefighters to now using this platform to highlight the accounts and activism of sisters in our movement, which at times, moved me to tears.

Every day I walk round the park and circle the loch several times, returning to where I started and going round again, and again. Rather symbolic of lockdown, every day the same as the day before like for the guy in Groundhog Day.

In the dark, children's voices

Guisers!

Too scared to visit Covid houses

The drink, a curse that can't be shifted,

the upbringing harsh and too commonplace

A man victim to nothing in his control,

reaching out to steady himself.

Although I had lived in the locality for more years than I cared to remember, it was the first time I had visited this part of Lanarkshire.

Nature joys in less polluted times

Stunning sunrises and sunsets

Starlight is star bright

Morning choruses of visiting birds

This was how we lived now, ‘the new normal’. How quickly we had morphed into a crazy existence where masks and hand sanitisers were just as important as keys and wallets.

Cannae complain about the dip in our mental health. It’s a big dip. It’s been an

almighty big dipper of a rollercoaster without the fun. We have plummeted big time,

many times.

The sad thing is, that this routine, is what my life was like before all this started. One thing we all agree with is that we are the lucky ones. We still get to go to work, we are still earning a full wage.

They talk about pay freeze

Our economy is shot

But the FAT CATS in power

Have hit the jackpot

No one’s entirely sure what's happening. Big Boris is AWOL, they keep wheeling random terrified looking stuffed shirts out to issue vague instructions, which are then contradicted almost immediately by the Scottish Government who are taking very definite action. Even if that action is just "wait and see what London says, then do the opposite." At least it's something.

Collecting trollies to stave off boredom, well trolley photos anyway,

Someone might like them and hang them in a pandemic-related gallery,

Testimony to something a little different, a reminder of change...

Sitting making shawls

Ten, one thousand

for nine hours a day

Eleven, one thousand

Binge watching Netflix

Twelve, one thousand

To keep the horrors away

Positivity We Will Get Through this, and it will make us stronger and appreciate the important things in life, health, happiness, and family. I am glad to be alive and I live life to the full, I tell my husband every day I love him.

Adverts on the box. FACTS. Don’t forget what that means. New rules, new behaviours that most of us go with it and cling to. We accept them. We clap for the NHS while we ask for more. Those that know and those that don’t feel betrayed by science and digital this and that. Surely, they knew and did nothing

Paper over the cracks. That’s 90% of working from home - maintaining the illusion of action. The Potemkin portfolio. You send some emails, check the work group chat for updates. You try to offer some big announcement - something that might make today feel like a day of progress.

School came to an abrupt end for the children on Friday 20th March. It was especially poignant for the Primary 7 children who left without all the usual transition events and leaving rituals which help to smooth their passage from primary to secondary school.

The transport industry continues to move, albeit at a crawl. Like many industries, COVID has decimated us. The railway, the lifeline of Scotland, is on it's knees.

It’s clear Covid has been a devastating disease, wreaking havoc around the world but my job as a mother was to shield my children from its horrors, therefore, we spent the early months ensuring each day was not only a distraction but an adventure.

My imagination starts to run wild as I feel anxiety rise in my throat. My face mask feels as though it's suffocating me, my breathing increases, my heart beats faster. It's so hot and stuffy. I feel faint, feel myself rocking on my feet and grab the trolley tight to steady myself as I close my eyes and count to ten controlling my breathing. The overwhelming feeling is panic.

It was a glimpse into another world and it was fun – in the middle of a pandemic, in a care home, we laughed, laughed at everything and at nothing and laughed because sometimes, if you didn’t laugh you’d cry

7 or 8 weeks of this ? ? ? - they brag about transferable skills in their workforce. Yet they never swapped shifts with people overworked and underpaid. We are all being responsible and super careful so, technically, any of the managers and directors working from home could have come and looked after the project they won the bid to run. But that would have been too much. It is much safer to clap from their windows.

Taking care not to push the button on the lights (there be Dragons; there be Covid on them surfaces) we waited for a pause in the torrent of traffic. Then, quickly forded the stream, and headed south and then east, picking up the trail of the White Cart Water.