What has changed in your world…?
I miss
Train-rides! And those silly tubs of coffee and fancy biscuits you have along the way.
Friends hanging out in cafés, nattering.
The ability to earn a living!
The events and courses now marked only by cancellation notices in my inbox.
Toilet roll, flour and pasta.
I note
Walking in the nearly empty streets, if someone should happen to come along the pavement the other way, we diffidently cross the road, or courteously circle around each other, looking at our feet and not breathing. Funny, because it’s almost exactly what we used to do when worrying people came the other way on a late night walk home, but now it’s conspiratorial and co-operative rather than a desperate attempt to be invisible.
I love
The clean, blue and white sky, not so dragged about by aeroplane trails.
Roads being easier to cross because of reduced traffic.
Using the time that used to be given to pubs and cafés to do all those jobs that have been nagging the back of my over-loaded brain for years, and finding out that most of them are quite fun.
Having himself here to complain to and mess about with while we wonder what’ll happen next. (Knowing that some people are home alone, it’s great that we have this here internet to write on, to read, to chat to each other and keep the news and the politics going around.)
Most of all I love
The way so many people immediately wanted to know what they could do to help, and joined in local plans to look out for others. The way, once we realised being careless might hurt others, most people stepped up their efforts to avoid spreading the virus.
The way we are beginning to talk about what we have learned – that when enough people recognise a need, we really can stop everything and change the way the world works. Let’s not just talk about the virus on social media. Let’s talk about everything, to be sociable and – if we can’t get rid of Mr Johnson and Mr Cummings, we’re going to have to change the world in spite of them, so let’s get on with planning it.
If you comment on this post, please tell me what’s changed in your world – and what’s changed in your thinking as a result.
Kay Green 
5 responses to “I miss, I note, I love…”
Nothing much has changed in my world, apart from the fact that we’re 30% down on volunteers at the foodbank due to those aged 70 and over, and those with underlying illnesses, being asked not to come in. Otherwise, same old. I don’t have any friends that I’m still in touch with anyway, many old friends are already dead, I don’t socialize, don’t go out to pubs/restaurants/cafes or cinemas. I live alone with 3 cats, just about surviving on JSA. The only major difference is that (so far as I know) I’m not required to attend the Jobcentre for 3 months, though I haven’t yet received any official confirmation of that.
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Bear in mind that people who read this will be thinking positive thoughts about you, even if only briefly.
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Oh no – risk of visitors! 😀
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@ BBEWDOR
Well thanks but I wasn’t meaning to say all of that in a depressing sad sort of way, more just a statement of fact. I don’t go out anywhere anyway so it hasn’t made much difference to me in that respect. I did go out socializing a lot when I was younger, always out in the pubs (most of which no longer exist) or going to parties, all-nighters, gigs, festivals etc. Been there done that, no longer interests me, and I can’t drink much nowadays anyway cos of stomach problems. Plus, like I said, many of my old friends have passed away now and the rest are all settled down with kids, Grand kids, the social scene that I was a part of no longer exists. And being on JSA I can’t afford to socialize anyway.
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Kay, I love this.
I’d talked to Cliff yesterday about the way that people now interact when passing each other. The giving a wide berth, the people who make eye contact and smile in a kind of rueful, shoulder shrugging but warm way, the people that hurry by.
I’ve forwarded it to family and close friends. Some of them are now homeschooling their kids – my Drama / English teacher daughter and single Mum has to still teach a couple of days a week; her brilliant Head has done a rota for the teaching of key workers and vulnerable children, some Heads are making ALL staff come in every day which means if they have kids they have to use the key worker facility and their kids have to continue being at school every day … unless they have another parent who is wf.
I’ve suggested to the homeschooling crew that the title of your blog could be a thinking / discussing / writing / drawing activity for their children!
Anyway!
Another sunny day! Hurrah!
I still feel a bit stuck. Still getting my head around it. Worried about Cliff. Trying to keep busy. Probably reading too much!
Thank you for this.
Julia x
Sent from my iPhone
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