2020 was always about perfect vision. The year 2020 was anything but… and now there’s vision of how a bunch of Queenslanders saw it unfold. You can watch too.

Last year, my husband Jeremy, a filmmaker and director of The Picture Club, regularly met up with a group of ordinary people living through something extraordinary. One on one, socially distanced, every couple of weeks, he interviewed them about how they were feeling. He asked them about the world, the pandemic and life in the year that was not living up to its name.

The result is a digital documentary commissioned by the State Library of Queensland that tracks the lives of six people in 2020. From April to August across lockdowns and through confusing weeks that brought good news and bad. A nurse, cafe owner, travel agent, teacher, teenager and a kid in grade three spoke without expectation or inhibition about how they were coping with coronavirus.

Somehow it seems like a long and short time ago because some of the reactions and emotions are repeating in 2021. The documentary subjects are regular people and perhaps that’s what makes them compelling. They’re real. They’re accidental narrators of their own lives. Their naive observations also became eerily accurate predictions.

COVID-19 Brisbane Video Diary promotional video from State Library of Queensland on Vimeo.

It’s now one year since Poppy the teenager curled up on her couch, stared into the camera and made a statement that was simple yet profound.

“It will change the world I reckon because nothing can go back to being completely normal after this.” She was right.

Ward the nurse swabbed COVID-19 patients and watched his city turn into a ghost town. He was calm and honest but never ready to relax even when lockdowns lifted last year.

“You could still easily have a second wave. It’s not over,” he said. He was right.

Keith the cafe owner, ever the optimist, kept changing his business and craved the day he could serve coffee again. It came and it went and it came back. Albeit with masks and square metres measured. Keith seemed to keep his chin up throughout.

“Hopefully people will come back and support us.”

He was keeping one eye on his cafe and the other on the bigger picture.

“I don’t know how the borders are going to be managed.”

Keith’s could still be saying the same thing in 2021.

Carla the teacher juggled fears about her parents and her children.

“Hands down, the biggest worry is infecting my parents. That’s my biggest worry, my family; my sisters, my brothers. We want to be together but we’re very aware that it’s not worth it in the long run.”

Georgie the travel agent encountered turbulence. On every front she flew through some of the toughest moments this pandemic served up in 2020. International airlines being grounded was a challenge at work, but she also became a teacher when homeschooling became a reality. Which of those two jobs was harder remains a tight race.

“I don’t know what the future looks like. That’s scary.” Georgie says.

“I don’t know if I’ll have a job. I don’t know if I’ll be working in a different industry. I don’t know anything right now which is hard, but I can’t focus on that because we just have to take each day as it comes and see what happens.”

Reckon Georgie cried when she saw the Qantas ad this week?

Then there’s Raphael, the kid in grade 3 who sat on his bed bouncing though the questions for the documentary. He missed his friends. He loved playing computer games. His hair got longer as the months rolled by. He’s gorgeous. He’s my son, so I might be biased.

It’s hard to hear a nine year old talking about missing his grandparents.

“I’m not allowed to hug them,” he said. “It’s the right thing to do but I don’t really like it.”

Ouch, my heart.

Last year was a blur for me. Perhaps that’s why it’s sad yet satisfying to have certain milestones documented. A family album that no one anticipated.

What was it like being behind the camera?

Jeremy says he’s grateful the six people agreed to share their thoughts in real time and now those experiences will be archived in the State Library of Queensland.

He watched the documentary with the people featured and it prompted such a curious mix of responses. Laughter, tears and disbelief about how things played out.

Long before we heard the word Delta, some of the Alpha experiences have been captured forever.

You’re welcome to watch it too. Sadly it might be time for another doco.

YOU CAN WATCH THE COMPLETE VIDEO DIARY BY CLICKING ON THE LINK BELOW

COVID-19 Brisbane Video Diary from State Library of Queensland on Vimeo.