<div class='fade-in1'> <h2 style ="text-align:center;"> "I am uninspired and restless in <i> my own home </i>" </h2> </div>
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<p> Returning from work, you enter your apartment, kicking off your [[shoes]]. You take off your mask, inhaling the lavender-scented infuser you put on before you left. You sanitize your hands, and step into your apartment. You relax, but sigh audibly. You start preparing for [[bed]]. </p>
<p> From far away, your shoe collection looks like a row of brightly lit houses. Your mask keeps you protected in a toxic deadly wasteland, it keeps you breathing in space. Your sanitizer is your weapon against a dragon that needs to be slayed. Your [[bed]] is a portal to another world. </p>
<img src="https://i.pinimg.com/564x/fd/81/05/fd8105c19d263900697369b920260408.jpg" alt="bed" width=80% height=80%><img src="https://i.pinimg.com/564x/12/18/e7/1218e7ea10bf4ec4fc5501f292f04fd1.jpg" alt="bed" width=80% height=80%>
<p> After doing your bedtime routine, you enter the bedroom. You then change into your favourite pyjamas, covered in tiny teddy bears. </p>
<img src="https://i.pinimg.com/564x/80/21/75/8021751f29df900465bc22081436ef9c.jpg" alt="open or close window" width=80% height=80%>
<p> You are trying to decide whether to [[open the window]], or [[leave it closed]] before heading to bed. </p>
<p> Peering outside, it looks cold and monotonous. The streets are close to empty, and those remaining give furtive glances to anyone in their vicinity. Your eyes latch onto one man, who you notice yanks his mask away from his face once he passes by someone. Whenever someone approaches, he [[frowns]] and pushes it back up, to cover his nose.
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</p><p> It feels claustrophobic in here. Your room is [[safe]], but it will [[shrink]] in size every time you come back. The scent of lavender, your mom's favourite perfume. It smells like home, but you know it's artificial. Your mom isn't here, and you haven't seen her face to face in months. </p><p> You think: everyone is always in a hurry now. A hurry to get home, to see their family. To be away from <b> people</b>. To not wear a mask anymore. <div class=mirror> A hurry to social distance </div>. Your present is [[suffocating you]]. You can't help but think it's [[stuffy]]. </p><p> <div class='shadow'> <i> It's hard to breathe. </i> </div> Your room is the same as it's always been, and that's frustrating. It should be comforting, but it's not. You don't choose to spend all your time in here anymore. <div class='shadow'> You <b> HAVE </b> to spend your time here. </div>
The fresh air starts circulating in your room, but it's not enough for you to feel like it's made a difference. <div class='shadow'> Your room is still the same. </div> You wish you could [[shrink]] to the size of a quarter, because then it would feel like you actually [[left your room]]. </p>
<p> Your creations keep you [[entertained]] while you are awake, and when you are [[asleep]]. </p><img src="https://i.pinimg.com/564x/0e/f8/f6/0ef8f67bc72544c788717cb9d96340fb.jpg" alt="bed" width=80% height=80%>
<p style="font-size:30px"> In your dreams, you're a kid again. You're still in your room, but it's so much <b> [[bigger]]</b>. </p>
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<p> The days pass in a blur.
[[Work, home, work, home]]. You stay in [[bed]] on weekends, because you don't have anywhere to go. You wish your apartment had a balcony, so you could relax outside. </p>
</div>
<h2> Work, home. Work, home. </h2>
<div class='shudder'>
<h2> Work, home.
Work, home.
Work, home.
Work, home.
Work, home.
Work, home.
Work, home.
Work, home.
Work, home.
Work, home. </h2>
</div>
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<p> [[Throw a paper airplane?]] </p>
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<p> Out the open window, the airplane glides above the frowning man, [[shrink]]ing as it gets farther and farther away. You wonder if you ever actually threw the airplane, since you don't remember making one. </p>
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<p> It's safe, but it's lonely. You've picked up sewing, as a hobby to distract yourself. Your bedroom is filled with brightly-coloured stuffed animals you've made, almost as if you're suffocating your loneliness, by surrounding yourself with [[stuffy]] substitutes for your friends, your mom, your dad, and your siblings. </p><p style="font-size:30px"> The possibilities are endless. Your bedpost is a mountain to be scaled, and the mattress a desert plane to be conquered. It [[takes days]] to cross from one side of the room to the other. Your [[quests]] in your dreams distract you from being lonely. </p><p style="font-size:30px"> The stuffed whale you made for your niece takes you across the ocean of dirty laundry on your floor. The dollhouse you bought for her birthday is where you live when you want to sleep on a hotel [[bed]]. </p>
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<p style="font-size:30px"> Behind your bed, you slay dust bunnies with a sewing needle. <div class=mirror> I hate needles, but I want to be vaccinated </div>. You are no longer limited by the size of your room, but by your [[imagination]]. </p>
<p> You wake with a start. You have to get ready for work. </p>
<img src="https://i.pinimg.com/564x/d4/c3/64/d4c3647c854f7399327d834e449e0cd9.jpg" alt="bed" width=80% height=80%><p> Your stuffed animals make a pillow fort with you. However, there weren't enough pillows so you steal toilet paper from your mother's hoard. <br> You hope she won't notice that the grand pillars to your fort are made of her <div class=mirror> quarantine emergency supplies </div>. I mean, you took her floss last week for a mountain climbing adventure, and she never noticed. She doesn't notice how her stashes [[shrink]] in size. </p><img src="https://i.pinimg.com/564x/99/43/81/99438124549a7aed9633b6baa683e599.jpg" width=80% height=80%>
<div class='blur'> <p> When your dreams and your waking moments feature your room, truth and fiction mingle; they [[bleed]] together. But what doesn't change is how you're alone with your [[imagination]]. </p> </div>
What day is it? You're bored.
<p> Do you want to [[fold a paper airplane?]] </p><img src="https://i.pinimg.com/564x/5d/a1/d6/5da1d6223d4d974c3595d6abb9cde2ba.jpg" width=80% height=80%>
<p> Your life is built on patterns, habits, and seeking stimulation while seeking comfort. As you fold an origami airplane <i> (a pattern you have made many times before) </i> you wonder when you'll fly it, or if you already did. Did you already make it, but throw it so far there's no evidence it existed? </p>
<h3> ...
Might as well make another. You have time.
[[Fold a paper airplane??]] </h3>
Written By: Jocelyn Knibutat<h2> Dealing with pandemical loneliness, monotony and claustrophobia in </h2>
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<p> Your life is built on patterns, habits, and <div class='rumble'> seeking stimulation </div> while seeking comfort. As you fold an origami airplane <i> (a pattern you have made many times before) </i> you wonder when you'll fly it, or if you already did. <b> Did you already make it, </b> but throw it so far there's no evidence it existed? </p>
<h3> ...
...?
Might as well make another. You have time.
[[Make a paper airplane?]] </h3><h3> What time is it? I'm sleepy. It must be [[bed]]time. </h3>