LOCKDOWN CASTELLDEFELS - DAY 62 – Saturday, 16th May

A lie-in today!  A quick visit to the bathroom at 7am and a return to bed and the next two and a half hours whisked itself away in a series of complex and no doubt character revealing reveries on that border land between sleep and wakefulness.  This did however mean that my window of legal exercise was somewhat truncated.

     One of the advantages of lockdown is the economy of dressing because I am nowadays fully dressed in six items of apparel: 2 sandals; 1 watch; 1 pair of glasses; 1 T-shirt; 1 pair of shorts-type bathing costume.  This means that after a more than usually cursory wash, I was dressed in seconds.  Pausing only to set Moppy off on her vacuuming sequence I was out and off on the bike.

    There were quite a few people around, especially on the beach and I wondered how many of them were near their homes as the seconds were ticking away before the next tranche of people were entitled to claim the streets and beaches.

     I cycled down as far as the end of the beach Paseo and then returned on the coast road, passing well-spaced queues at bakeries as I returned.  For the last part of my cycle home I re-joined the beach Paseo to check up on the people who were there on my way down.  My anticipation of exasperation was somewhat stymied by the obvious diminution of numbers of exercisers and the appreciable increase in the more obviously elderly section of the population.  In which, of course, I do not place myself, as there are over five months before I can claim entry into the most senior category!

     I was a little over the limit by the time I got back to the gate of my home, but I passed no police and, anyway, there are richer pickings for them on the beach.

     This evening, as long as the weather holds, and there is bright sunlight at the moment, I will have to go for a more substantial cycle to make up for my sloth in keeping to my bed this morning.

     I am also lucky in that I can walk around the communal pool at any time to augment my exercise regime, though it does get somewhat tedious and I feel as I make circuit after circuit that I must look like one of those nodding donkeys that Dickens described in Hard Times as it did the same thing again and again, as being “in a state of melancholy madness”.  This picture is not helped by listening to In Our Times on a Radio 4 podcast and alternatively chuckling and giving a little grunt of satisfaction as another element of knowledge is momentarily added to my store!

     Each time I go out on my bike I am acutely aware that it is a substitution for my pool swim, and not a satisfactory substitution.  Although I look forward to the time when swimming is allowed again, I find it difficult to imagine how they are going to make it safe.  I know that the authorities have said that normal disinfecting techniques in well maintained pools should deal with the virus adequately, it is difficult to see how physical distancing will be safely maintained, especially in the pool itself.

     Our pool has five lanes and with the usual numbers of swimmers, lanes have to be shared.  It is difficult not to bump into your partner swimmer from time to time, and even if you don’t you will be passing each other in close proximity each time you complete a length.

     I suppose that with five lanes, you could have five swimmers and swimmers could book a time to swim?  What about children?  They do not keep to limits and anyway I do not want to be anywhere near them.  It is a difficult problem and one that will not be solved easily I think.  Though I can’t wait to see how the management of the pool suggests a solution.

     It is easy to say that we have not thought the New Normal through – the government certainly has not – and I think that we will be constantly surprised at how many of the aspects of our Old Lives will have to be modified to take account of the virus.

     The National Trust has said that in the future all of its properties can only be visited by those who have a specific ticket, the Old Normal of Just Turning Up is no longer something that you can do.

     My season ticket for the Liceu and the opera season has now been cancelled.  All of the shows that I was due to see have been, at best, postponed.  But, without a vaccine, how is the seating of patrons going to be done?  Will seats have to be reallocated allowing an empty seat between patrons?  How will the audience be brought in and allowed out, without the usual crush?  Will we have to wear masks during the performance? 

     The average age of an opera going audience is substantially older than the general profile of the population and therefore the majority of patrons are in a much higher risk category – how is this going to affect the future of opera?      

     Already the financial hit that the Liceu must have taken has to be substantial and serious; given the other demands on state coffers, how will the Liceu justify extra tax income to keep it alive?  And theatre?  And orchestral concerts?  And ballet?  And museums?  And art galleries? 

     All of those companies must be in dire financial straits!  And what about the corporate sponsors?  They must be feeling the financial pinch as well.  It is a perfect storm of threat for anything cultural. 

     The cultural future is bleak.

Meanwhile on the technological front: my little cleansbot works, but the sensors which tell it is falling off the mattress are not working and so it duly falls.  I am prepared, at the moment to believe that the fault lays in my reading of the instructions – or rather my skimming them and hoping that a few presses of the on button will sort everything out.

     I will obviously have to be a little more careful in my application of haptic hope!

I listened to the Minister for Education and even I was flabbergasted.  He spoke as if the past didn’t exist.  As if the way that the Conservatives have treated teachers and education over the last decade was a completely different sphere of reality.  His mealy mouthed concern for the under privileged was almost comical, his desperate sympathy for kids who were at risk was ludicrous.  What the hell does he think that his government has been doing over the past ten years?  Has the way in which the government has cut social services, education and everything that austerity was used as an excuse to decimate resulting in the present state of the NHS, Care Homes, and . . . it is really hard to express the level of disgust that I feel when someone is speaking and expecting me to forget their destructive history in the very area that they are taking credit for and trying to get me to be sympathetic about their ‘supportive’ attitude!

     Given the way that the Conservative Government has mismanaged virtually everything about the virus so far one can have absolutely not confidence whatsoever about their ability tao make the return of kids to schools anything but a disaster.

     The level of testing in the NHS is inadequate, why should we expect it to be anything other than inadequate in education.  Why should teachers risk their lives when there is little evidence to suggest that there will be little more than empty words of support rather than actual pieces of PPE and availability of sufficient testing?  With the very real threat of kids being asymptomatic there would have to be extensive testing on a regular basis and efficient contact tracing before any reasonable return to school could be contemplated.

     Yet again, I have reason to rejoice in the fact that I am retired!

LOCKDOWN CASTELLDEFELS - DAY 56 – Sunday, 10th May

I woke up this morning to the sound of rain and the threat of the “thin end of the wedge” challenge to exercise: if you don’t go out for your bike ride because of a little dampness, then what will you do if the sky is merely overcast tomorrow?  Will that be excuse enough to defer effort?

     Admittedly, rainy days are in the minority in this country, and therefore the opportunities for indolence are fewer too, but the rot can set in at any moment, and the dust can settle on a machine that is meant for motion!

     I do have waterproof leggings and a lightweight rain jacket so it is perfectly possible (if unpleasant) to go for a bike ride and stay relatively dry.  On the other hand, it does make the ride more duty than pleasure.  On the other hand (making three, by my computation!) exercise is essential for the preservation of a healthy lifestyle under lockdown and so the (unpleasant) effort should probably be made.

     As you can imagine, I indulged in such pleasant prevarication, while reading my Daily Dose of Misery from the news section of the digital Guardian and doing the Quick Crossword and, of course, drinking my essential cup of tea.  Time well spent.  And dry too!

     Eventually, I decided to test the weather and, after extensive sampling of the climatic conditions (i.e. opening the kitchen window) I reasoned that, while it was still damp it was not actually raining so the ride could be taken in relative comfort.

     It was only when I was gloved and helmeted with the bike newly charged and ready to go, that I looked at my watch.  I had missed my age-specific designated time slot for exercise, so back upstairs for a cup of tea?

     In the eagerness to return to the comfort of the sitting room I conveniently forgot the possibility of the mind numbing circling of the communal pool as a substitute for the more open and interesting vistas of the Paseo.  It comes to something that I have to write about it before the possibility of doing something that I outlined in the previous sentence becomes an imperative.   Moppy (for it is she, god bless her mechanical revolving cleaning pads) is about her business on our tile floors and therefore the presence of my obstructing feet are an impediment to her efficiency and I should remove them to the pool.  So I will.  And service will be resumed after I have listened on another episode of ‘In Our Time’ on the hoof!

     Which was Mandeville’s ‘Fable of the Bees’ – a book I own and have never read, but now I will be able to bluff my way and make links with present economic and sociological thought.  That’s what ‘In Our Time’ is all about!  Learning with walking stick in one hand and umbrella in the other and weaving my way around sun loungers to make the circuits a little bit more interesting.

     As the weather is glum, there are few people about and I am sure that gatherings of the ‘bike gangs’ (that makes them sound so much more threatening than these al fresco bike mounted chat groups are) will be loath to form without the clemency of warm weather.

     As it is Sunday, I will make one of my commercial outings to the pollo a last to get our chicken meal.  As well as facilitating the provision of food it also gives an interesting view of how well physical distancing is enduring.  So far, the distancing has been exemplary, although rain does encourage grouping under awning, so it will test discipline!

     And I can now confirm that discipline was preserved and, apart from the kids who now seem not to wear mask as a matter of course.

Rather than listen to the Blond Buffoon who was speaking at 7 pm I went out in the rain on my bike rather than listen to his bluster.  The lead up to this talk (Why on a Sunday?  Why not in parliament?) was a master class in communication ineptitude as expectation was allowed to distort any possible message.  The new slogan “Stay alert” is confusing and dangerously ambiguous, it just adds to the general air of desperate ‘fly by the seat of your pants’ approach that has characterised the methodology of this government.

     Spain too is easing restrictions in a stepped approach.  You would have thought that any easing would only be in those areas where the virus had been shown to be limited, with extensive testing to verify any such limitation.  Why then has Madrid decided that it is one of the regions where restrictions can be relaxed when the number of deaths and new infections is still rife?

     In Spain and the UK, it would appear that the political is more important that public health, and unless that is reversed then we are going to pay for that in more and more deaths.

Tomorrow is our weekly shop, something I look forward to with pathetic excitement!  There is an added delight this time, as I have to find some ant traps to combat a mild infestation upstairs.  Always something to make like just that little bit more interesting!

LOCKDOWN CASTELLDEFELS - DAY 34 – Saturday, 18th APRIL

 After ‘Moppy’ had done her work; the Guardian Quick Crossword had been completed; my blend of Earl Grey and English Breakfast tea drunk, it was time for my walk, accompanied by the comforting fatuousness of ‘Saturday Live’ on BBC Radio 4.  I also had a purpose other than gentle exercise.  I was looking for raw material to serve as ‘illustration’ for my PIHW Chapbook, Coasts of Memory.

     As I have often bewailed in the past, I have little technical ability in drawing or painting and so I have to rely on photography to get me out of illustrative predicaments.  The situation is made somewhat worse because of the lockdown that obviously restricts my range of subject matter.  I have therefore taken the ‘pleasure in small things’ approach and told myself that I am perfectly capable of finding variety in restriction: from the terrace on the third floor to the far wall of the communal swimming pool, my area of activity might be limited, but it is (I tell myself) rich in illustrative possibilities.  I have therefore taken photos and they await my ruthless editing!

The one shining light of Trump’s ‘Presidency’ is that he is terrified of being a ‘one term’ holder of that office; every other thinking person’s terror is that he should be anything else, after all it is going to be difficult enough to sort out the human, reputational, financial, moral, institutional, legislative, aesthetic and political morass that he will have left after a single term, let alone the horror of his being allowed to play with the USA for an extra four years!

     It is obvious that Trump has decided to stop at absolutely nothing in his aim to retain power and the latest horrific indication of the depths to which he is prepared to sink is evidenced by his encouraging demonstrations against some states’ lockdown restrictions. 

     Trump’s base ‘base’ is essentially rural rather than urban and with his encouragement of the grouping of extreme right sets opposing health and science predicated lockdown, he is hoping for a conflict that he thinks might show him to be the champion of the voice of freedom against those (Democratic) governors who are seeking to repress the true liberties of right thinking Americans to court death and carry guns – and you can scatter as many quotation marks around in that last sentence as your liberal sensibilities dictate!

     That in a time of a catastrophic pandemic the Presidential Egoist can think of fostering something like Civil Disobedience if not Civil War would be unbelievable if it were not Trump.

     On an incidental note: if (please god) Trump is a one-term President, can you see him attending the inauguration of the new Democratic President?  Can you see him visibly handing over power?  What excuse will he make not to attend?  How will he even be able to get through the transition period when he should meet his successor?  If you think back to the intensely embarrassing meetings with Obama when he looked like a naughty schoolboy with a stupidly long tie, what are the ones going to be like with the person who beat him?  My mind finds it difficult to place Trump in any meetings that emphasise his failure to hold on to office.  How can anyone as thinly narcissistic as he bare it?  The thought is something that keeps me warm at nights!

     Talking of narcissists, how long is it going to be that our airwaves are going to be free of the bumbling banter of the virus courter?  He has signally failed to resign because of his dereliction of duty in wilfully becoming infected and I dread to think of the fawning adulation of the gutter press when he bumbles into view, bravely leading our country to destitution and ignominy, after the searing affliction of his virtually self-inflicted illness.

     Meanwhile we have the political chancer, Matt Beckett, the ethic-free (give us a job!) pitiful holder of the Secretary of State for Health portfolio refusing to give straight answers to the almost criminal shortages of PPE for our front line health workers, or indeed anything else of crucial interest to the remaining virus free part of the population of the UK.  I wonder how he is going to convince us that there are 100K tests by the end of the month?  We can dispense with truth, that has never bothered him in the past as he has changed his principles as often as his underwear, so how is he going to square the circle so that he can keep his comfy job.  His past record shows that he is capable of the most egregious U-turns, so I await his contortions.  Resignation will never come easy to one who has swallowed so many of his scruples to get where he is at present.  In some ways it could almost be funny to watch his antics, but people will die because of his incompetence, so smiles will be inappropriate.  Perhaps they might be allowed as long as they are sardonic!

After a fairly glum start to the day there are brief periods now when sunshine is squeezing out from behind the clouds.  There are distinct patches of blue and that bodes well for a sunny later afternoon.  I live in hope.

The PPE situation now seems desperate in the UK.  The weekend is the time when certain medical institutions will run out.  This is an utter disgrace and if it does happen then the Health Minister must resign immediately and the rest of the tossers in the so-called bloody government.  And the fact that worthless trash like IDS and the unutterable David Davis are pontificating about the present crisis after their assiduous cheerleading into the last one over Brexit is more than depressing.

     I am very well aware that trying to get anything like efficiency and normality in a crisis situation is difficult and there has to be leeway for the unexpected, but the necessity for basic supplies is fundamental and that is where this so-called government has failed so signally.  Why are our deaths so high?  Why did we wait so long before instituting the lockdown?  Why are basic materials in short supply?  So many questions to which our political leaders have no real answers.

     Why do we tolerate them?

LOCKDOWN CASTELLDEFELS - DAY 24 – Wednesday in Holy Week, 8th APRIL

 

I realise that, with all my bluff optimism, I have been affected by the lockdown!  In the poem that I wrote yesterday (smrnewpoems.blogspot.com) I actually questioned, even if rhetorically, the value of sunbathing!

     It is shocking to have to confront a possible breakdown in your worldview that can contemplate something as self-loathing as a negative approach to the appreciation of the nearest star!  It is certainly a wake up call to reassess my attitude and determine to be more positive in the future.  The idea of getting to June and July and behaving like a troglodyte is entirely unacceptable.

     If something as fundamental to my view of life is capable of mutability, then it makes me wonder what other, more subtle changes there have been in this period of self-isolation.  It would argue a self-deluding insensitivity to say that one can remain entirely stable when the world appears to be changing around you.

     The irony, of course, is that the micro world of self-isolation is unchanging and stable.  The continuing horrific catalogue of death and infection is all around us, but not part of the life that we are leading.  It is as if we are living in some sort of medieval fort with a water filled trench around us: part of our surroundings, but separated from them.

     Unlike some others, I have been entirely unable to wean myself from the news.  My addiction to the Internet radio, and more specifically Radio 4 is total.  It is at times like this that the Conservatives detestation of the BBC becomes not only partisan, but also self-defeating.  At times of National Crisis we united around the BBC as a voice of and to the Nation.  I certainly do not look towards the Conservatives and their slavish news lap dogs to give me a sense of what the Nation is thinking or feeling.

     And The Guardian.  As a life-long Guardian reader (with a brief fall from grace and adherence to The Independent) I now read it on my mobile phone with an intensity that goes beyond belief.  And may I make a specific call out for the writing of John Crace, a columnist of rare wit and perception.  His political sketches have been part of the reason that I have been able to maintain my sweetness and equilibrium during the past few years where Brexit and the bloody Conservatives have convinced me that I am living in a society where the dominant ideology is the death-wish!

My early morning routine is now becoming more and more established: set Moppy (don’t blame me, the app demands that you call your robot cleaner something) off on her hoovering circuit; make my cup of tea (English breakfast and Earl Grey) and have the World’s Most Expensive Augmented Muesli (at least I have stopped adding Smarties to it) with fat-free milk; do the Guardian Quick Crossword (with light cheating); change Moppy to her mopping sequence; go for my pool circuits.  And a chunk of the day is gone!  Which is a clear exemplification of the work expanding to match the time available!

     I do miss my daily early morning swim and I can’t wait to get back to that part of my routine, because that morning start include my first writing of the day when I sit in the café or outside having my post-swim cup of tea.  Ah!  How life used to be!

Just back from the open kitchen window where at 8.00 pm our time, we applaud the front-line workers who are keeping our society going.

     Talking of health workers and their battle against the virus: the British Prime Minister now in Intensive Care.  As I said yesterday, I wish him better health and strength to his family – and he should resign.  Now.  At once.

     The Prime Minister’s bravado a while ago where he was joking about his meeting Covid-19 positive people and shaking hands with them; his visible inability to maintain social distancing when his government was promoting it as essential, now appear to be a foolhardy, self-indulgent imposition on health services that are overstretched.   

     I might also add, that the Prime Minister’s inability to give clear indications of who actually has ultimate power in government is a dereliction of duty.   

     chocolate, retribution, judgement, ineptitude, Throughout his career he has been first and foremost a second-rate, shoddy, narcissistic, journalistic liar and, while I have sympathy for his present state of health, I have none for his political.  We deserve better than him.  Though with the cabinet of freaks that he has accumulated, god alone knows who (or in the case of Gove, what) might take his place.

     So far the Conservatives’ management of the Covid-19 crisis has been fatally inept.  How many unnecessary deaths is it going to take before the people of Britain demand the reckoning that should come sooner rather than later?

Determined not to end this post on a sour note, I can report that we were able to buy chocolate in the last shop and you can be assured that my writing has been sweetened by the confectionary. 

     So just imagine what it would have been like without!