I don’t
think about coronavirus as much as I did a couple of weeks ago.
I’m lucky to
be spending the lockdown in a small village in a remote and beautiful corner of
the world. We’re blessed with glorious
weather so I occupy my time walking the clifftops of the Lizard peninsula,
exploring new paths and photographing the wildlife. I’m not ignoring the news, but neither am I
obsessively reading or watching it. I’m
a teacher in the middle of the Easter holiday so there’s no pressure of work
and my concerns for the summer term and the children in my class and their
families can wait a few more days. When
the new term begins, I have what I need to work remotely and will do the best I
can. I miss my friends but we’re in
touch via social media and I’m fortunate to have company here – someone with
whom to walk, talk, eat, watch tv and play games. There’s no complacency in this village but
there’s little sense of an emergency either.
Thankfully,
I haven’t been directly affected by this terrible disease. Through social media, I know of a handful of people
who have been unwell with Covid19 but no-one I know has been hospitalised and
no-one I know has died. It seems
impossible that I won’t eventually be personally touched by it, but like all
the things we dread most, I’ll try not to think about it until I have to.
It’s
impossible to forget about the virus, but in my good fortune and the lockdown
rhythm and routine I have created for myself, I am finding consolation and
peace.
Nonetheless,
I’ve found that my routine includes two points to every day when thoughts of the
virus are especially inescapable.
The first is
the short-lived and disbelieving moment each morning when I wake as if from a
nightmare. In those blurry, disoriented
seconds, I dare to think that none of it is true. None of it has happened. The virus, the pandemic, the emergency, the
fear, the lockdown, the isolation: they’re all so unimaginable as to only be
possible in some darkly imagined dream.
Then, as the personal reality of the new day dawns for me, the brutal truth
of Covid19 solidifies once more and I remind myself of my good fortune, resign
myself to the restrictions and another day much the same as the last, and I hope
I can stay positive.
The other is
at the very end of the day, when I find myself alone once again. It’s then that I feel crushingly sad. It’s then, surrounded by the literal darkness
of night, that I can’t help remembering the impact this emergency is having on
others. Pictures and reports from the
television news come back to me: the confused old man in a care home kissing a window
– his daughter on the other side; her tears; exhausted nurses holding back
their own tears; desperately sick and fearful intensive care patients,
struggling to breathe, surrounded by machines; the patient saying what could be
a final goodbye to a loved-one before being sedated and ventilated; the
bereaved denied their last goodbye, a last kiss, time to hold hands and facing an
inconsequential funeral. When I finally
turn to sleep, it’s with relief that I have few ‘alone’ times to dwell on the
awfulness of this epidemic and gratitude for the monotony of my days.
As of
yesterday, 1.7 million people worldwide have contracted coronavirus and 103,244 have died. In the UK, 917 people died yesterday bringing
the total number of hospital deaths to 9,875.
It’s now thought that the UK will be the worst affected country in Europe.
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