It’s now Day 1,149 of the lockdown and I’m starting to detect an air of change. I feel I’ve aged 20 years but that’s just being stuck in with Mater. Yes, she is still alive much to my surprise, if not hers. Always one to have a finger on the pulse of the modern world I’ve noticed that the roads seem to be a bit busier and there are more people in the park. This fits in with the smell of Spring in the air and the hints of renewal all around. Have we decided to release the lockdown ourselves without reference to the government or is it an optical illusion? I want to see it busier therefore it is?
The lockdown appears to have lasted forever but in fact is only 6 weeks, technically only 41 days. It just seems like 1,149. They may have seemed like the longest 6 weeks ever, even longer than summer holidays appeared when you were young but it is only 6 weeks. However, even if the lockdown was lifted tomorrow the rest of Spring and Summer will not seem like Spring and Summer as we would usually know it. There will be no sporting competitions, festivals or garden fetes or RHS shows. All of the things that we would usually attend have been cancelled. So I would encourage you to try something new this summer. Go to an art gallery, museum or follow a heritage trail. Find out something interesting about your home town and go and take a photo of it and put it on social media. Encourage members of your family to do the same. Learn to play a musical instrument or bake the ultimate cake. Take up a new non contact sport – archery, golf, geo caching, orienteering (something mad Norwegians do for a sport). Whatever you do don’t stay in and complain about the rubbish on the tv, which frankly has been terrible. We all need to acclimatise to a new normal, in fact completely write off 2020 and just skip ahead to 2021, it’ll be easier.
So don’t forget Stranglings I’m here looking out for you. Stay safe and well and remember this too will pass. See you on the other side.