The Covid Diaries Pt 2

It's a blue moon, apparently. It’s Halloween, apparently, and it's pissing down; nothing new there then. The washing machine is doing its duty. Masks, not the spooky kind, need cleaning if any semblance of the day is to be maintained. I have registered a need for a fresh supply of underwear daily but somehow don't seem to be able to grasp this new concept. The world is almost at a point of covering every orifice to make human contact possible.

I sat using my phone last night and chewed over the tier system, 2, 3. New news scrolled in my notification bar.

Oh no, scratch that; we are in a full lockdown from Thursday, apparently.

I don't want to get out of bed.

Now the cat is warm against my side, and Facebook seems more enlightening than drudging to the supermarket in the downpour to fight for bog roll.

I feel unsure that I will be able to reach the zen-like state of epic proportions experienced last time. The relationship I had with the living room floor was profound. Down there, the world was a safer place to be. The sofa cushions sprawled like pieces of Madeira sponge and scattered blankets made a landscape for viewing during afternoon tea. Outside, the sky was blue, bluer than we had known, and inside, classical music became a replacement for the traffic whirring on the Finchley Road backed up by the muffled drone of passing aeroplanes. My moods swam between sombre, disquiet, reflective, mundane and peaked on an existential crisis.

I am reluctant to acknowledge that today will be different to any other. I have slipped in and out of my own kind of lockdown for seven months. Self-imposed rituals become a way of life. Yoga, Hatha, Vinyasa... Do the Hokey Cokey, meditation, simple food and ferrying my daughter to and from the mandatory institution that keeps the light of Covid aglow.

Sitting at the kitchen table, I have often thought of Covid’s sticky feet wandering the walls and stairways, meeting with its chums to break bread and copulate. The extra protein markers mean that parties are possible on the dining hall tables, and showers of anti-bac spray are a minor disappointment in the march to freedom. "Die for your cause,” they say.

I picture myself floating above the empty school hallways at night with a UV light picking out the congregations singing praise to the petri dish of life. It didn't take too long for my daughter's year to send the entire cohort home for several days whilst an inventory was carried out of who had been in contact with their favourite human.

I am shamefully aware of my discontentment when she returned to groaning at her screen and going through the motions of avoidance tactics. I ticked each box as it came, nodding my head in silent agreement.

I saw that one coming. Yes, you’re hungry, you can't find the file so, you did nothing

for half an hour instead of hollering up the stairs for help.

It feels like some kind of retribution for getting away with not having to hand in nine assignments in May. They sit completed on my desktop in cahoots with the political factions of Covid 19 and the Brexit party, a daily reminder of what goes unheard, the voice of the people playing out on a megaphone and pushing me deeper into a comfortable agitation.

Outside in the real world, Boris makes decisions to prolong his undemocratic dismantling of the UK. Inside the radio now hums grime, as another layer of hopeful youth believe they are the first to stumble upon a voice for the disenchanted masses.

I took apart the kitchen clock. Two double AA's did not manage to restart time. There must be something in its simple wiring system; it's not complex. I contemplated crossing the wires. In the real world, this would create an epic fuss of screaming or tears, the occasional bloody nose, but here in my kitchen, silence hung as the tick-tock failed to join the nuance of suspended animation.

A conversation with Arthur Dent somehow feels applicable. Perhaps a play on Radio Four? I would like to turn the dial on an old transistor radio, feel the bristly fur of static between stations, the whistles of “Dogger, Cromarty.” Throwing in the sense of belonging to another era mixing with the pelting occurring on the patio.

A text message just came through to tell me that Sean Connery is dead, and regaining the warmth of nostalgia has returned to a dystopian apathy. The “new normal” hovers over my head, and the whirr of the Finchley Road gains traction with the ringing in my ears.