What Fresh Hell is This?

So it's been a while. Almost 8 years to be precise. Lots has happened but not much more important than the current global situation which has brought me back here to offload my thoughts. They're multitude and muddled.

It's the 75th Anniversary of VE day too, which shouldn't pass without comment. It's an odd state of affairs; a celebration of our freedom from war and the recognition of the heroes of the time juxtaposition-ed against the current fight, captivity and a celebration of a different kind of hero. #NHSHeroes. Not sure we were using hashtags when I was last here in 2012. A new language has evolved and with more recently added vocabulary; elbow-bump (that came and went within the space of about 2 weeks) replaced by social -distancing, track and trace, lockdown and acronyms now in everyday use; PPE, wfh. WtAF? (not new, seemed appropriate).

Life has settled into a routine of daily exercise (100 miles walked in March & April), food shopping, eating and otherwise trying to fill the hours. New pressures and anxieties; the weekly trip to the supermarket, being judged on whether your lockdown is productive enough or if your trip out of the house is deemed essential, or if you're risking your loved one's life handing over a pint of milk. And loo roll, flour, pasta are restricted purchases. Should we clap for the NHS or, preferably just not vote Tory next time?

Holidays have been cancelled - I'll get to that later, Mother's Day was a wave and a chat from the driveway, running with friends is a distant memory as is a drink at the pub or browsing the shops or going to the library.

Schools have been effectively closed for 7 weeks up to today, so I've been wfh mainly and only going in a couple of mornings a fortnight, to provide for the children of keyworkers. It's a risky business. The children haven't yet learned the meaning of the new vocab and can't reliably judge two metres. Attempting to social distance is like herding cats.

We've had it easy in our household, I've no doubt. We have a garden, I can still check on mum, I'm not trying to home-school three small children, I'm not shielding a medically vulnerable person, she's on the other side of the world. It's wearing though. It's boring and most of us have had enough. But it's the new normal and we have to put up with it. Stay Home, Protect the NHS, Save Lives. and we're luckier than many countries from a lockdown point of view, it's less strict here, but we may pay the price for our freedom later. We're already paying to be fair with a death rate second only to the US globally and the elderly apparently deemed collateral damage to an ineffective government. At the outset, when Wuhan was in lockdown almost overnight and residents were arrested for being on the street it was happening in a distant city with an oppressive government and most of us thought; 'that won't happen here'.

How easily we gave up our freedoms.