On the United Kingdom of Great Tiers

Folks the UK has gone mad. Well it feels like it has at any rate. Apparently food shortages now constitute of lack of availability of essential foods like lettuce and citrus fruits. Whatever will we do!?

I feel like the news outlets are contributing more to this mass hysteria and it makes me laugh, whilst simultaneously shaking my head in irritation. It’s like they go around finding random people in an otherwise well-stocked supermarket and asking them if they haven’t been able to find anything, and the one random guy goes ‘Er, yeah, the lettuce shelf is EMPTY. EMPTY, can you see? My wife is waiting for lettuce at home and THERE IS NONE LEFT.’

And then they pan over the shelves groaning under the weight of a million other foods, and finally rest the camera on a couple of empty plastic bins that once contained lettuce but now do not.

WhaTEVER will we DO!?!?

Now everybody wants to rush to Tesco to buy toilet roll and rice and eggs, for some reason, because doing their massive Christmas shop was not enough, somehow. And nobody is going to risk not having toilet paper because last time they ended up using lettuce instead and now there isn’t even that to fall back on.

Anyway it feels to me like our prime minister is a prime buffoon, who cares mostly about being popular hence the constant teetering on the edge of various rules and turning back on himself. He doesn’t know whether he is coming or going, to be honest, and reassures the public that he does in fact use a hairbrush when we know this is a lie, as he has been caught on camera mussing up his ridiculously blond hair… I think he likes looking like a deranged old owl.

London is now in Tier 4 which means total lockdown but that has not stopped people from the South of the UK travelling up to Tier 2 areas such as York for a quick pint, and getting arrested for doing so. Is that just an entitled attitude that southerners have? Because when us lot up North (I say ‘us lot’ but I am really a Southie by birth and heritage oh dear even though I do live up North) were in higher tiers of lockdown none of us took a jolly down South for a pint, did we? Well I didn’t hear of any of us getting arrested for doing so, at any rate.

Anyway I don’t care about Christmas being cancelled. I am heavily pregnant and have a lot of work to do in the 5 weeks before I give birth. I am so heavy, the heaviest I have ever been in my entire life. I am swollen and in pain and just generally feeling bLARGH. So I focus on other things to distract me from my discomfort and that tends to be the news, work and of course a busy toddler.

I just want to have my body back to be honest, and want coronavirus to piss off. I want to be able to lie on my back without feeling like I am suffocating and just… oh dearie me. It’s not a good time for much, folks, but it’s as good a time as we will get so we better make the most of it.

What are your Christmas plans?

Stone Cold Silent Still

It is different this year.

I can feel it and smell it and taste it.

There are more lights.

Twinkling through the night.

Signalling the happiness that seems to lie beyond reach but… oh hey, hullo, what is that softness I feel in my fingers as they graze the icy air? Could it be…?

Entire streets in my town are lit up. Santas climbing through windows and peering down chimneys and knocking on doors, carrying sacks of what we can only assume is hope. Desperate hope.

And people who never made an effort are making one.

It’s a bit like the American movies.

We take little one out for a small walk before dinner, when it’s pitch black under the heavy drapes of the winter sky at night. And all the houses are decked for conquest. Each competing with the other.

So eerie, if you stand still and let the breath cloud away in front of your face. Stone cold silent still, twinkling lights in the darkness. Sometimes faint bells ring and sometimes a disjointed jingle sears through the thickness of cold.

But then a pair of bright eyes meet yours from down somewhere by your knees, and tiny little fingers grasp your solid warm ones, and little feet stamp stamp stamp excitedly, and it’s not eerie after all. It’s joy. We all need a sprinkling of joy.

I see a light at the end of the tunnel. I am so so scared, but so hopeful too!

What are your plans for the holiday season this year, folks? Can you see and taste and smell it yet?

Rules

Are you following coronavirus rules where you are? What ARE the rules where you live? Is your government/local government making this clear?

Are you TIRED of coronavirus?

I am tired of it but since my son is asthmatic (hopefully it’s only childhood asthma but you can never be too careful) I am wary. So wary. But I have been doing things in this second wave that I would never have dared to do in the first wave.

Like taking my son to the supermarket. Out of necessity more than anything really, but this is something I would never have contemplated in the first wave. I feel guilty about it and like I am doing something VERY WRONG. He is 20 months old this Saturday (I know right, wow?!?!) and the supermarket is a strange and expansive place for him. He is in awe of it. Now if that isn’t a side effect of a pandemic then I don’t know what is.

I make sure to stay far away from people, and thankfully EVERYBODY I see wears a mask, because it’s the law now to wear masks in indoor spaces. And when something is the law in the UK, social etiquette demands that people adhere to it, no matter how much they grumble about it in their own homes. If one doesn’t adhere to it, they will definitely be discussed about contemptuously around dinner tables. (Tea tables if you’re ‘up North’). I live up North and so far, indoors, most people wear masks.

Who knows what really goes on, eh?

If you’re interested in some good thorough coronavirus news from the UK, check out this blog post. Ellen Hawley writes concisely and in a very entertaining way about the various things the UK is managing to do (and not to do) during this pandemic.

Lockdown for me

Fireflies and blossoms dying and grass growing from seed carefully sprinkled on freshly raked topsoil. Every single day things grow. New shoots poke out from between the cracks in stone tiles, and lilies shoot up so high they are a shock to see on sunny, summery mornings.

Hunger sitting in a belly, for hours and hours, gnawing and gurgling until it is satiated with a plate of spaghetti tossed in olive oil, garlic, chilli flakes and lemon rind.

Small brown paws explore fresh compost, putting it into empty buckets and down little shirts, tumbling over soft baby skin and fat cheeks streaked with the remnants of what a baby has had for lunch.

Exploring waits for no man. Exploring does not even wait for a face to be washed.

Diggers and dumper trucks work hard at removing rubble from an ancient building site, the old Victorian signage toppling down under the sheer brute force of heavy metal machinery. Large brown eyes stare in wonder as the dust rises around high-vis  jackets and yellow hats reflecting the glare of a May sun.

Lilacs dying and being replaced by masses of large round yellow roses, their lemony scent overpowering and sailing with the breeze down a deserted road.

Broken images and a clamour of familiar voices from a computer screen, then silence and the thumping of little feet from room to room, carrying objects from one end of the house to the other.

Shrubs miraculously turning into trees, and the incessant watering of lupins lest they shrivel their purple blossoms up and wilt.

Daily bursts of motivation following slumps of deep exhaustion, and days blurring into a sludge of minor events following each other like dominos.

What is lockdown like for you?