Few Hundred Days of Solitude

Autumn came for a short visit this year, strolling along, lightly trailing her yellow fingertips along the tops of trees, painting them with liquid sunshine.  

She didn't stay for long though. I guess she had better places to visit. 

Always leaves in a huff, as if she's mad about something. Maybe it's Winter that drives her off, with his bitter cold winds that whip the pretty gold orange red leaves off branches, scattering them in crispy colourful paths along the ground where they slowly curl up and die.

Winter this year strides in in-synch with the second wave of Covid, followed by what should have been an expected lock-down in England but caught me unprepared.

The remains of the First Wave had yet to recede and this Second Wave has already crested and crashed upon us.

I remember cheering myself up during the first lock-down on how amazing it would feel once things went back to normal... 

How great it would feel to hug friends, to go sit in a cafe and have a frothy cappuccino. How doubly trebly grateful we would be for the simplest, most taken-for-granted things.

I guess I didn't realise or think about how there was no concrete return to normal - subconsciously rejecting the popular phrase 'the new normal' (who wants to get used to walking around in masks and obsessively sanitising your hands, not hugging or walking too close, not visiting friends or relatives?). 

The lock-down was lifted tentatively, and instead of the unbounded joy and relief I had expected, it was mild paranoia that filled me on my first visit to a cafe after some three odd months. By the time the fear abates, it's already mundane again. 

And even though we had a brief spell of partial normalcy, the social distance remained. Not exactly a metre or two, but still it was, and remains, a life devoid of human touch. 

No handshakes, shoulder taps, hugs and kisses. An odd awkwardness we have gotten used to. You can see and talk to one another, hand a coffee cup over, maybe pass the salt. But no touching. No tweaking cheeks, no slinging arms, no putting your head on a friend's shoulder, no taking a cousin's baby in your lap, no pecks, no 'it's gonna be okay' embraces.
 
The general relaxing of rules showed us what's important in life I guess - shopping and dining out rather than hugging and chilling at home. The economy is more important than social needs. I guess the argument is that it's safer to shop in a large department store than cuddle with Grandma on the couch? I don't know the science behind it and I can't delve into all the research out there so I guess I just have to accept it.

It does feel like an episode of Black Mirror - the government dictating your interactions with friends and family, ordaining a 2 metre physical distance - you can't even see a picture of your mate's new baby on their phone at that distance - 

At the same time offering discounts so you can go dine in restaurants, get your hair cut and finally visit Primark and buy a ton of cheap cute things.

But now you can't even do that so no movie nights at your friends and no burritos at the new Mexican restaurant with anyone!
 
It's getting colder but every now and then we get that crispy frosty sunny morning that makes winter seem lovely. For a day. 

I wonder if we will be able to get back to the Old Normal, or will we just forget how to initiate physical contact? Will there be a press announcement telling us It Is Now Ok to Hug Others, with a side note of 'but only six people in total so please select carefully and your right to hug is restricted to these six individuals only. Those under the age of five not included'.

I guess this is what we get for constantly whining about how the world is such a dark place and life is so hard  - remember, pre-Covid days when we used to grumble about things like broken coffee machines and train tickets getting too expensive?  

I just hope when this is all over, it isn't so gradual that we don't even notice the resumption of all the things that we miss so much right now.





Comments

  1. Aisha, we all are feeling sad but people's feeling of sadness is expressed in widely different ways.There is some positivity as well in New Normal way of life.

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