Journal of the plague years

The days of the week melt into each other. It is hard to know when we are.   There are regular zoom meetings set up but they arrive almost unheralded because we have so little fix on anything. Last night we went out into the street at 8pm and made a charivari for the NHS. It was a strange, distributed, echoing sound. I enjoyed clashing a big saucepan lid with a wooden spoon. It felt properly medieval. I could see small clusters of people on their doorsteps, joining in. No-one wants to get close to anyone else. Ostensibly this is to be virtuous - not to pass the infection on to anyone else, but of course more powerfully, it’s because we don’t want to get the damned thing ourselves. Out for a walk just now we happened to see Harold Goodwin, chairman of the FavSoc, who has famously actually HAD the coronavirus and is now recovering. He says he picked it up in London, ‘that shit hole’, and never wants to go there again. He says, ‘it’s really nasty. You don’t want to get it!’. ...

We have had such a marvellous spell of fine weather - clear blue skies, warm sun during the main part of the day - that it’s almost like summer. We have had lunch outside almost every day for a week or more, and work in the garden has been quite strenuous and pleasant - tidying away the detritus of winter, and preparing for the light and heat to come.   It is an act of wilful extravagance to come inside to write this when I could be out there, luxuriating in the joys of a perfect English spring day. But actually it’s easier to see to type inside. We are so fortunate to have this house, these options. I feel we are like Roman senators in retirement, wanting for very little, just aware of the distance from the centre (and also from those we love).   For us, untouched by any personal grief or deep anxiety (or any anxiety) for the last week or so, this is like a prolonged holiday, and that is what people passing by say too.   We are tranquil. We enjoy the peace. We t...

It has been this way for a long time, and part of my nature I suppose, that I play the part of a small cog in the running of things. Andrew, on the other hand, tackles the ‘big’ things. So while he amasses and uses builders’ kit, materials, plumbing, wiring, plaster, carpentry things, tools, gadgets etc and achieves works which are relatively public and long-lasting, my works tend to be very small, routine, anonymous, lubricant really - laundry, washing up, wiping down, tidying.   I pull his clothes the right way round before they dry so that they’re ready to put on, and he doesn’t know that.   I dead-head, water, repot, sweep, clean.   I do these things because they need doing, I quite like doing them and get some satisfaction (even though I do get irritated when the clear tidied spaces I have made get mucked up almost instantly….sigh).     This has been noticeable in the longer term aspects of my life too. It wasn’t that I was short of grand ideas - thing...

Crab Apple Tree, April 2019 I’ve remarked on this before. Under the stress and strain of this weird situation people are moving backwards in time.  That’s partly because they can’t access all the pleasures, tools, facilities, shops, gadgets, conveniences they are used to (and those almost by definition are going to be modern and up to date), and partly because there is some sort of security and satisfaction in going back to the old ways of doing things. So, you can’t buy bread (well, you can now, again, but there was a shortage for a while)… so you make some. The internet is awash with people talking about making sourdough, or no-mix methods, Dutch ovens, the shortage of flour and yeast, etc. and posting photos of their loaves and buns all over the place.   How long is it since people routinely made bread? Before the last world war?   This had been evident in fashionable urban areas for about ten years in a milder, premonitionary guise in t...

It has taken me a long time to settle to making any art….   Yesterday at last I found a suitable book, and created enough working space on a table in my very crowded attic studio, and had an idea of what I wanted to do…. a painting of a piece of blossom….   There are so many fruit trees now, covered in the most beautiful and varied flowers. Each species is similar in the flower designs, but distinctly different and I wanted to chart some of this… I started with pear….. But half way into my painting a friend rang.    This is a guy from Faversham who has spinal problems and has been very restricted in his social and working life for the last 2-3 years, and is frustrated and lonely as a result - that’s well before the coronavirus lockdown.     So we had a long long conversation, which was lovely, but stupidly I continued to fiddle with the painting while we talked, and of course I ruined it (from my pov). It has brought nearer to the surface my anger and irri...

Now there are two different things going on.   For us and those we happen to meet or chat with (zoom, WhatsApp, email, phone, chance passings-by when we go to the shop for food), things have calmed down. The positives of our predicament are the main topic of conversation: how lucky WE are to live in spacious houses, with gardens, or with nice walks nearby; how lovely the weather is; how we are well (so far, touch wood), and feeling fine. Just fine.   The mad panic has subsided. There are more things on the shelves in the supermarkets, and Tesco at least has instituted a sort of chicane for going in and coming out, and they’re wiping down the handles of the trollies and baskets.   The timing of who shops when has been accepted (more or less) by the local people, according to Facebook and Twitter, though there are still outraged reactions from some who dislike the behaviour of others - standing too close, coming in to shop in family groups, being selfish……     So...