I listened, properly. I was perched on the edge of the sofa, leaning forward, hanging on to his every word. It was important that I didn’t miss anything and that I fully understood. It wasn’t long before I felt frustrated, “Spit it out, man, stop bumbling.” Then annoyed, “For goodness* sake, Boris.” Soon I was angry, mainly with myself for waiting most of the day ‘for enlightenment’ only to find myself wading through a sea of verbal nonsense from someone struggling to string a proper sentence together. Anyway, nothing has changed for me and I will continue to self-isolate.
Lockdown is no problem to me in so far as I love being at home. I am safe here, not stuck here. As well as doing the things I enjoy, I have taken the opportunity to spring-clean and sort out. I kept putting off doing the little room. This is the upstairs box room, which was the nursery for our children. It became the computer room, going back a bit, when monitors and processors were massive. Add a desk, chair and a printer, and one person could comfortably work in there. Later, it became the study. New desk, lap-top, wireless printer and walls lined with book cases which soon got filled. Our eldest grandson calls it our library. He likes to have a bedtime story from my children’s collection when he sleeps over. This little room has also become a dumping ground for things that are in the way but still wanted and not to be confined to the attic or the shed, well, not yet.
I made a space for myself by chucking a few things out that shouldn’t have been in there then got started on sorting out my writing. Exercise books, notepads, scribblings. Unfinished poems, opening paragraphs, some completed stuff. A couple of rejection letters, kept to keep me grounded. Plenty, and I mean a lot, of written nonsense, some made it to the bin, but a few items showing a glimmer of promise, might be worth picking up again. Published work, a thin folder, but one of which I’m proud and has a self-awarded gold star. My work-in-progress novel which hasn’t seen much progress lately.I didn’t dare to start reading that otherwise nothing else would get sorted out. It isn’t nonsense, though, it needs work. I spent two afternoons just on my writting stuff and I discovered that there’s a flicker of hope on some of those hand-written pages. I have rejection letters but I also have lots of positive feed-back and encouragement, enough to tell me to push myself out there while I still can. And with nothing to lose, I must.
So self-isolation continues. The news is scary, the outside world is too scary for me. I don’t support Boris or his party but I have to pay attention, however cross he makes me feel. I won’t return to work to mix with the public before I can see my family, that’s nonsense. I think it is too soon to lift restrictions but I was disappointed at his lack of clarification. I didn’t expect him to be specific, because he isn’t, but I hoped to hear something that I could safely interpret to mean it would be fine to have my grandchildren round and see family members, even briefly. They are worth the wait.
Here’s Spike Milligan,
Scorflufus
By a well-known National Health Victim No. 3908631
There are many diseases, That strike people’s kneeses, Scorflufus! Is one by name. It comes from the East Packed in bladders of yeast So the Chinese must take half the blame.
There’s a case in the files Of Sir Barrington-Pyles, While hunting a fox one day Shot up in the air And remained hanging there! While the hairs on his socks turned grey!
Aye! Scorflufus had struck! At man, beast and duck. And the knees of the world went Bong! Some knees went Ping! Other knees turned to string From Balham to old Hong Kong.
Should you hold your life dear, Then the remedy’s clear, If you’re offered some yeast – don’t eat it! Turn the offer down flat – Don your travelling hat – Put an egg in your boot – and beat it!
Spike Milligan (1918 – 2002)
*Choose your own word here – mine wasn’t ‘goodness’.
Thanks for reading, take care and keep safe, Pam x
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