This is an installment of Pandemic Purchases, a special series of personal essays about the items bought in the last year that brought the most value and joy to our lives and work while living in lockdown.
Sometime in February 2020, before we all descended into lockdowns, I began to notice that my blackout curtains were getting threadbare in patches and developing tiny holes. When the Manchester sky allowed me some morning sun, these holes let in beams, straight as arrows, right to my head, whatever angle I lay in bed. And once I’d noticed them, the holes became impossible to ignore.
I sought quick cures because replacing the made-to-measure curtains seemed too expensive, time consuming, and labor intensive. None of my quick fixes worked, including pasting stickers on the damned apertures. Mostly, they just fell off. And by now, it was deep into the pandemic-driven lockdown in the United Kingdom.
The answer then lay in putting an additional physical barrier between me and the intrusive daylight. Casting about online, I landed on a bamboo room divider, which I reckoned I could rig between the bay window and my bed. At around £60 ($85), it seemed an okay buy.
As ever, I dawdled a bit before screwing my courage to the sticking place. I am really bad at returning things. (Besides, a six- by eight-foot bamboo item might present special logistical problems.)
A few days later, I placed the order and was a little confounded when the thing arrived, rolled up, and resembling a floor mat more than anything. I fought the urge to return it right away and briefly considered using it as a mat.
The divider was definitely made from real bamboo and backed with what seemed to me like cheap but serviceable gray carpeting, polyester, the description said. It was made up of hundreds of strips of bamboo, cut to equal size and stuck lengthwise to the backing. That made the whole thing very flexible, so that I could bend it into lovely curves. Stability, though, was a problem. It could stand all right, but that depended on how strategically I could construct the curves. It was a bit hit-or-miss.
I had a period of trial and error after having the displeasure of the whole thing toppling on me one night. I’d inadvertently kicked a pillow at it.
I began to understand that the divider would work better if I could somehow stabilize it by wedging it between the wall and some furniture, giving it some purchase. As my bed had no headboard, the answer became obvious. I jammed the flexible divider behind the bed, but only so much that a good half of it remained free so I could mold it around the side of the bed to shield the light. It worked a dream. I could position the divider just so. Stray beams of light were neutralized. It looked a little unusual but I have grown accustomed to the asymmetry. It has other benefits, too. I could fashion a little alcove by giving the divider an extra curve and leave in that space whatever little thing I wanted: cigarettes I no longer smoke but enjoy looking at now and then, some books, a nightlight I rarely use—you get the picture. Best of all, the divider gets turned this way and that to suit my moods, creating curves and semicircles against the backdrop of immovable straight walls.
While working from home, I spend a good eight to 10 hours of the day in my bedroom, which also serves as my office. The bamboo room divider has a day job too. When I go on Zoom or any video call, it is fairly easy to drag the divider to hide whatever mess is lurking in my room, at least on the side facing the camera. In a few seconds, the mugs and papers and dirty laundry are hidden behind a curving bamboo wall, the unmade bed only a memory.
The bamboo itself—though its original bamboo scent is long gone—reminds me of sun, of home, of Malaysia, of makeshift beach shacks. Places I’ve left behind. When I’m inspired, I hang off the bamboo pieces of textiles I’ve accumulated mostly from Southeast Asia, freeing them from the box under the bed.
I’m now thinking on getting another divider, possibly also in bamboo, for the other side of the room.
