Lockstalgia is a portmanteau of lockdown and nostalgia and it means a fondness for the time when the world was in lockdown. Granted, not many will look back fondly on these memories, but some will. If you are now required to go back to the office full time, you might reminisce about the time you could work remotely in your pajamas or take the dog for a walk during lockdown. You might have started new hobbies during this period that you stopped doing once pandemic restrictions lifted and life went slowly back to normal.
The Collins Dictionary’s entry for lockstalgia is defined as “nostalgia for a time when the country was in lockdown, or in a more extreme form of lockdown.”
Lockstalgia also appears in the Cambridge Dictionary blog as one of several new words that entered the vocabulary in 2020:
a feeling of nostalgia for the lockdown period of the covid-19 pandemic.
Above all, just as you may have entered lockdown with purpose, exit it with purpose too. If you do not, then you may start having feelings of “lockstalgia”, and start regretting that you did not keep doing the things that you not only found more efficient but preferred and actually enjoyed.
Mark Pittaccio, a business consultant and behavioral economist for Quilter Financial Planning has some suggestions on how to avoid feelings of lockstalgia:
[the] things we did during lockdown happened in a set of very strange circumstances, and were partly driven by survival instincts. As we move forward, we need to consider how we adopt new things as the traditional rhythms of life resume…Above all, just as you may have entered lockdown with purpose, exit it with purpose too…If you do not, then you may start having feelings of ‘lockstalgia’, and start regretting that you did not keep doing the things that you not only found more efficient but preferred and actually enjoyed.
Citywire
In writing for the Daily News one author sums up their reflections of the pandemic, restrictions and lockdown: “To look on the bright side, as life begins to embrace the ‘new normal’ in our homes, cities and communities, albeit the imaginary horrors experienced by those like me, let’s store all the experiences of the past few months in a secure part of our minds for a time when we may look fondly upon the months of lockdown and tell our grandchildren and great grandchildren stories of how ‘My boss tested posi for the ’Rona so I was in iso. Popped down to the supermarket for some sanny, but it was all Magpie’d.’ Let’s call these memories, lockstalgia” (Dissanayake).
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Sources:
Dissanayake, Aditha. “Lockstalgia.” DailyNews. October 5, 2020. URL: http://www.dailynews.lk/2020/10/05/tc/230489/lockstalgia.
“Lockstalgia.” Cambridge Dictionary. September 7, 2020. URL: https://dictionaryblog.cambridge.org/2020/09/07/new-words-7-september-2020/.
Melony. “Lockstalgia.” Collins Dictionary. July 8, 2020. URL: https://www.collinsdictionary.com/submission/22592/lockstalgia.
Pittaccio, Mark. “How to avoid ‘lockstalgia’ as pandemic restrictions end.” Citywire.com. July 2, 2020. URL: https://citywire.com/new-model-adviser/news/how-to-avoid-lockstalgia-as-pandemic-restrictions-end/a1374637.
Sassi, Mike. “Lockstalgia” tweet. Twitter. May 14, 2020. URL: https://mobile.twitter.com/MikeSassi/status/1260932428098461696.