Isolation diaries part 18: This is home

By Andrew Johnston

Oct 27, 2020

I-I-I, I-I-I, I-I-I hope, do you wannaLet go o-o-o, o-o-o do you wannaThis time I-I-I, I-I-I, I hope you wannaLet go o-o-o, o-o-o ‘cause this is home

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~ This is Home by Blink-182

I MADE an observation at the weekend.

I was watching the NRL Grand Final where the Melbourne Storm were playing.

Now, I know rugby league is still nothing in terms of its popularity in Victoria to the AFL, which had been on the night before.

But, like many Storm fans, I watched as the number of supporters went up.

It seemed to me like the entire state, whether they were fans before or not, united behind our team.

Likewise, I had seen so many more Super Netball fans following the Vixens in grand final week.

This isn't a complaint — I don't see it as bandwagonning or any of that nonsense.

What I think is we are just united at the moment.

We've had one hell of a year in Victoria this year. At every other turn, there has been something terrible.

And I've so often seen people in our state say something like "if you're not in Victoria, you have no clue what we are going through.”

It's true — people on the outside haven't the foggiest what this year has been like.

We do. We've all been through it together, and while it's been tough, it's probably brought us closer together.

So seeing a team (for the second week in a row) wearing the Big V symbol on their jerseys, playing for Victoria, brought us all together.

When Cam Smith said the premiership was for us, I think we all felt it.

But that's nothing compared to Monday.

Premier Daniel Andrews revealed that Melbourne was moving forward with the easing of restrictions, and that within two weeks the "ring of steel" was going to fall.

Again, we are one state.

Finally, it feels like the end is here.

Coronavirus isn't going away, but we feel like this never-ending madness of lockdown is going to go away.

We can go and see family and friends in the city, and feel safe doing so.

It's a good feeling.

As soon as I finished work I rang a mate from school who lives in the city to organise to have a beer in a few weeks’ time.

It's been well earned by both of us.

We'll both be home in Tassie at some point, and while our friends there will have their own lockdown experiences, they'll be nothing like ours.

We will carry them for a long time.

Everyone in Victoria will carry them together, we will always be unified by what we went through.

Our home has been through hell, and we've all had to experience it.

And that will bond us for a long time to come.