In dialogue: Katrina Niebergal & Andrew Wilson respond to the Call Centre prompt via a series of isolated segments from transcribed conversations.
1.
Soon, I’ll be on a plane and wearing a mask for 9 hours.
I wonder if I’ll get a row to myself?
I was just sitting outside looking up and there were two jet streams in the sky.
I’ve been noticing how criss-cross the sky used to be.
I was thinking about at the beginning of this (Covid-19 pandemic).
All of the talk of change that it might herald. But, you know, there has been so many episodes since then.
I don’t know if it has stopped, but I’m hearing it less.
Looking up just now, I was thinking, asking, are we going to change?
Or will the sky go back to being covered with criss-cross lines?
People have been gardening more, noticing and talking more about plants.
About what’s happening in their garden. That’s something.
Yeah, like, actually having the time to watch and realise plants (too) are living things.
How is it there now?
People are going mad here, with this new lease of life:
“I couldn’t go out for three months and now I’m going out dammit”.
It’s like a fervour or something.
Is it the same there?
There has been an unfamiliar and uneasy energy.
I don’t know if I’ve just got used to it now or if it’s changed again. But, to be honest, I’m not spending too much time outside.
Parks have been more populated, and I wonder if this is evidence of change, where instead of spending money, in shopping centres or pubs, we go to parks.
Lots of people have also been not been working, or laid off.
Yeah, and that will kick-in even more so as the state pulls out the support it has been offering. They will not want to hang-on to this level of welfare, as it disrupts their entire ideology.
Here there is TOZO for entrepreneurs (self employed?) who cannot make money.
I’ve been getting 1050 (euro) per month. This is the scheme.
But you are back at work now too?
Yeah, two-days. I just feel like I have so many things to do right now.
Especially the visa thing.
Ok and you are leaving the country too?
(Laughs) Yeah, its fine.
I don’t think me leaving will affect the visa stuff. Golly, so much admin.
Being back at work, having a regular pattern is disruptive to the studio groove that I found under lockdown. The job feels like hurdle which is disrupting my flow. Under lockdown I could glide through time, fewer hinges, less tethering.
I could flow, and now, with the job, that flow is curtailed.
This sounds like I’m complaining and I’m not,
I’m really grateful for the work and my position.
But at the same time ...