Lockdown and Beyond

When it started it was sort of an adventure, we'd heard from the people trapped in Wuhan that they had been told it could be transmitted through the mouth and eyes and the man who eventually got out and had not had the virus had gone out wearing goggles and a mask. We were cautious. 

We only went to the supermarket (trying to find flour, pasta, tinned tomatoes and toilet roll - which all the hoarders had already bought up). The streets were eerily empty - unusual for a large busy city. It reminded us of the 70s on a Sunday - nobody about, people going about in pairs, no traffic. We kind of enjoyed it. 

And then it kept going and going. We watched the numbers. The infections and death rate came down. We stopped hearing about anyone having the virus or being ill. Our high street (poor neighbourhood) was just as busy as normal (not able to shop for a month's worth of goods at one time people had to go out and do their shopping like normal). Working from home became the new way - tedious team meeting after team meeting, high level of anxiety and talk talk talk talk. 

We had projects at home. Lots of improvements, using found stuff. Fixing stuff that had been needing help for a while.

And slowly we crept to a 'new normal' - not going out, visiting people at home, sitting out in the garden (the weather was great). Got a hot tub. And a suntan. Garden looked like a tropical paradise. Did all my meetings from the garden. People wondered where I was - looking more like Barbados and less like Tottenham the more the summer went on. 

Work started discussing the return to the office. Some of the staff welcomed a slow return. Others not so much. 

Protests started. We happened upon one on a cycle ride with my niece. No notice about it, not information anywhere, just suddenly rounded the corner into Trafalgar Square and there it was. Weird mix of hippies (civil liberties and freedom) and seemingly right wingers from out of town (George flag, and Union Jacks, hoaxes, anti-vaxxers, 5G conspiracies). More kids and dogs at this protest than I have ever seen. It seemed to be over, the stage was gone, the people were retreating. 

The police were still fired up and in clearing the square got rather over zealous (we weren't in the protest, we had come to take photos sitting on the lions) but they didn't pay attention to our three bikes and open backpack and said the Panther had not left the area quickly enough and arrested him. Trying to throw him to the ground he stood and said he was willing to go with them to make it clear he wasn't resisting arrest, they still huddled six officers around him and took him off to the loading area. 

Subsequently they announced new 'measures' or is it restrictions? Not a new lockdown. But I sit here with the cooler weather, at the window of what has become my new office and feel forlorn. I don't feel like I have left the house for more than a couple of hours in six months. My world has shrunk beyond any comprehensible scale - never in my life would I have thought I would be so tied to one place and experiencing nothing of the world at large. I used to ride the bus just to get out of the house - all the way to the end and back - such were my itchy feet when I was a teenager.  Fed up. Fed up with the sensationalising of the dangers of the virus. Convinced the unemployment is about to skyrocket. Don't feel that the government has any idea what they should be doing. And I feel like our lives are passing us by - I'd really like to be doing more of what I like to do (making pots, painting, gardening) and forsaking those things that we have to do for money. 

Brewing Storm

Yesterday's front never reached the back of our house - it remained for a while a ridge of building cloud when I looked out front but it eventually burned off giving way to another warm evening that didn't drop below 28 degrees even in the dark. 

The heat was up again this morning, but about 2pm a cool breeze blew in, noticeably cooler, almost 10 degrees. The sky is grey, the leaves are rustling in the upper branches, a lone helicopter passes overhead in the distance. 

I am listening to Astrud Gilberto singing Once Upon a Summertime in the background - in looking through a stack of old records to see if he wanted any my father picked a album out with this on it. Very 60s lounge sound, excellent for working to. I also had to listen to A Man and a Woman - reminding me of my mother and the records they used to play in the early 70s.  Waiting for the rain. Sort of quiet, sad and breathy female vocal. 

On the news there is flooding and pictures of huge downpours over red London buses. Not here yet. Amazing how localised the weather can be. A sprinkling of rain comes down, enough to feel the prickle on your hot skin but no opening deluge. Its expectant. Just a matter of time. I'm hoping for a huge crack of thunder and perhaps some lightning just as starting point. 

Fat drops come down at great speed. Plink plunking in the pool of water I have keep cool. Time to move indoors except that the cooling hot drops are lovely respite from the recent heatwave. Its like being in the sea in Thailand in the rain. Lovely.

And almost as fast as it started it has stopped. For now.

Front

There’s a hot wind blowing from the west, whipping up the clouds in the upper atmosphere - big and frothy with crisp edges picked out by the sun. It’s the fourth day in a row that has reached temperatures over 30 degrees. Without the air conditioning at the office the hot wind is a welcome respite. 

The cat is hunting mice in the bamboo from next door that juts up against our wire fence. She pokes her arm into the dead leaves that have accumulated and burrows down to see if she can catch them. I can’t see them. I wonder if she is just chasing the wind in the leaves.

Sounds of children playing outside have rung out all day. Heat excitement. 

The slow rumble of thunder rolls through the sky in the distance. Underlying the sound of the urban trains going past, the wind roughing up the leaves, and the distant dual carriageway. Absolutely no emergency vehicles. My neighbour is out, his only presence the click of his cigarette lighter. 

Tube Travelling 5

Down and outs of the underground

Everything hurts, face scarred, fingers torn and filthy, an empty coffee cup, held out as a container, begging the commuting workers and tourists for spare change. In a changing world less change available. Screen faces ignoring the plight of the stricken and hungry. He looks at the people he is throwing his life out to, nobody engages, nobody sees this person. A person. A soul. Lost but a soul. Lost in the depths of whatever despair is afflicting him. But he studies us. And we ignore him. 

Tube Travelling 4

There are an unusual number of observers on the tube today - 3 out the 12 where usually it is just me. Everyone else lost in their world of screen - games, music, downloads and the usual odd woman engaged in her morning makeup rituals. I briefly cross eyes with the other two, interest in their eyes, reflecting back my own. 

Tube Travelling 3

Years of travelling the same route, then forced to redirect on the whim of the underground bosses - directed walkways and thought-through one way systems that interfere with the age old desire for humans to find the path of least resistance and so in defiance of the rules we walk through no entry tunnels and earn a few more minutes grace on our journeys much to the bemusement of more rule-abiding tourists. 

Tube Travelling 2

An ashy old man in an olive parka sits on the Victoria line holding a plastic bottle of water, his hand is twitching making the bottle squeak in that creaky plastic bottle way, while he watches a large beige woman  transform herself in a morning routine that ought to be performed at home. No preservation of the mystery is left to the imagination - face sculpting with shades of foundation and powder, eye shadow, mascara, lash curlers, under chin shading. Fascinating to the man. Amazing to me that it takes so much makeup to look bare faced.

Tube travelling

The neurotic itchy people seem to pierce my eye more readily than the still calm people. Leg twitching, uncontrolled expressive faces, tics from too many drugs, inability to sit still, those with ants in their pants. Drawing myself to bring up my inner stillness, collecting myself in self awareness, holding each muscle and bone in deliberate poise, extending elegance to counter the messy, jerky, tic-y thing that I am watching. 

Distressed Voting

Never has it been such a difficult decision, faced with an arms-length of choices, it ended up being purely tactical, on the back of a number of alarmist futuristic prognonsis's from old novels (1984) and borrowed novels (kitchen library at work - Tracer by Rob Boffard), and populist media (first episode of Years and Years on BBC). We have been sleep walking into being a state with more CCTV than anywhere else in the world, like we have more dangerous streets than anywhere else or more untrustworthy citizens,  persuaded we need smart meters to watch our energy consumption, a police force using drones to spy on us, and we wonder why we have high anxiety.

Pigeon

There's a pigeon at the cake stall in Kensington High Street Station. One of those soot covered dark street pigeons that London has (alongside the healthier looking white doves, white dove crosses with street pigeons, wood pigeons and collared doves). Clearly a hankering after pink sponge cupcake crumbs this morning. Whether he arrived up the steps from the tube station platform or along the marble tiled atrium from the street passing those-that-can breakfasting at Bills is unclear but I smile at the infiltration of filth into the seeming perfection that is Kensington (they steam clean the pavements here, don't you know) - dog walkers with 6 hounds each walking in Kensington Palace in pristine workout kit, ladies lunching with their lapdogs in their handbags, botoxed and collagened into perfection, elderly couples in appropriate leisure wear (blazer and loud chinos, and a skirt suit). Its certainly far from Seven Sisters - insistent preachers, chewing gum street, beggars, winos, crush of inhabitants mingled with a drunk away crowd and a miserable home crowd (Tottenham supporters - I can never tell from their demeanour whether they have won or lost), overflowing rubbish bins, roots event flyers, fag ends.

Perceptions of Colour

Four youths waiting for a Victoria line train at Kings Cross are arguing about colours. What colour is this? They start asking for second opinions from other passengers. They light on absolutes as colours to check. Is this brown or yellow? The woman is wearing a fluffy mustard zip up jacket. Yellow! Nah brown. Nah it’s orange. I put in my tuppenies-worth - it’s mustard - otherwise known as dark yellow.  They all have a different opinion. One claims to have perfect vision when accused of his eyes not working right. It’s quite likely someone has some colour blindness. Next is a purple coat. They all went purple. They can’t agree on a pink vs purple shade of deep pink (possibly a bit magenta). 

I read a book recently called The Secret Lives of Colours - fantastic book - delving into the history of colours, individually named, some very similar to each other but historically known differently. Stories about their popularity, rise and fall. Fantastically interesting. I wish I had had it with me. For after this book there is no simple yellow, red, blue, green absolutes. There are only shades, nuances and possibilities. No one-dimensional argument can be won when each eye may perceive each hue differently. 

Longing

She’s young, sitting legs crossed, arms up holding a mirror slightly over eye height colouring in her eyebrows, checking they are evenly full. Fluffs her fringe and is finished. She puts away the trappings of beauty, uncrossing her legs, thick thighs in black tights spread as they lean against the seat. Knee high black leather boots. Short denim skirt has ridden up into her lap and reveals the space between her legs - covered but still a revelation of knickers hiding under tights. The man next to me, is watching TV on his mobile. His eyes flick from the screen up her skirt and back. 

Standing while I sit. He has smiling eyes, silver streaked hair and light beard. Talking to his companion, they mirror one another. Design. I expect, of some sort. I have to hold back from reaching out. My hands have a desire to touch the textures of this man. Well worn-in tan leather satchel. Blue corduroy jacket. Thin wool sweater covering round belly. 

My hands are missing the pleasure of Zephaniah in the night - fur, foot pads, curled up body and body heat. The symbiotic pleasure of stroking a purring cat. 

Zephaniah Trouble Thomas

Zephaniah had to be rehomed today. Two male personality clashes. He couldn’t learn to behave.  I’m bereft. Hope it subsides soon.

Waiting

5 mins for a circle line train. Station staff on the tannoy calling for an urgent attendant to a “human spillage on the edge of platform 3”. Image in my head of a pile of falling people over the edge. Then vomit. Vomit not poop I’m hoping.

Top Secrets from the Underground

I don’t know many real secrets of the underground having never worked for them but I do know that at Manor House they have installed a new escalator (the middle one of three) and when it is running (which isn’t often) if you ride it you can race the other people going up. And you know what? You are going to win, because that escalator is super fast - you will overtake about 20 stationary bods without walking yourself. And strangely nobody else seems to notice this joy!

Painting

We have been painting. Continuing on from creating an homage to the Panther's mother we have kept going. For me its about learning to mix the paint and creating a likeness.

Happy New Year (and its almost a twelfth over)

I've been missing. Guilty. Two readers have now mentioned it to me. Sometimes I'm feeling like I have nothing to say, or nothing that can be said, or something. And the phone version of blogger going missing isn't helping me.

I have had a cold for what seems like three months, it comes and goes and resurfaces when I'm just about feeling better, and a back ache that the physiotherapist decided was the pelvis bone rubbing, which was on the left hand side and over the weekend jumped to the right with all the excruciating initial pain it had.

We got a new kitten to keep our remaining cat company - I think they get on - they spend most of their time in the same space but older cat seems to get annoyed with younger cat's playful antics (she doesn't take kindly to be leapt on and straddled with a neck lock, every time she walks past him), and he can't seem to help himself. He is the Panther's cat really - came and sat on him when we went to choose and made the choosing easy. They have a special bromance going on which is a big surprise when the Panther used to be sort of allergic to cats. I keep threatening that its time to castrate him but can't quite bring myself to - scared of changing his personality - quite like the bravery and gusto that he attacks life with - climbing trees, carrying stuff around (last night it was incense sticks, paintbrushes and pens) and the fearlessness that found him mostly submerged in the bath this morning trying to keep his head up. He's a people cat which makes a mad change from our previous two - my sister still doesn't believe they existed since she hasn't seen them. And loves bubbles

We spent Christmas in Dundee, and new years in London revisiting friends we had not been in touch with for some time. And ate haggis for the first time ever (don't tell me what its made of, it just did taste delicious), nips and tatties to celebrate Burns night with a couple of Edinburgers. 

And on the back of that Sunday dinner were given a film tip to watch - French movie - Untouchable, which was excellent. Heart warming romp of a film, clash of cultures, based on a true story.

I'm currently wearing a pair of glasses with a missing arm which for a persistent glasses wearing is a bit unbalancing (I feel skew whiff in the worst possible way) so am off to see if the glasses shop will put a new screw in.

Leopold

Six years ago I got two cats from a litter of my friend’s aunt. To catch the mice we were having trouble eradicating (didn’t take them long to do the job). There was Philomena, and her brother Leopold. He was fluffy tabby and a little podgy when he was younger. Recently he suffered with anaemia, weight loss, overheating, dehydration and last week we had to have him put down. I feel guilty that we couldn’t keep him healthy. And we miss him.

Reading Murder Mysteries

So reading murder mysteries seems to make me notice the odder things in the daily commute - a woman who had her dress on inside out - labels on the outside, a woman with a beard, extra tall possible basketball player in lime green. Perhaps it’s time for some romantic fiction to change the mood.

Playing people tessellation on the tube

Crammed in

Pressed up against the last man in’s backpack. Two people force their way on behind me. Small woman who can’t stand still and fidgets in the curve of my back on the right. And a large older man who I feel trying to stifle chesty coughs through his barber jacket

At Paddington lots get off. Shuffle around. Sharing the pole with a pole hogging American who doesn’t seem to mind that her breast is pressed against my hand and her warm hand is cupping the top of mine. Plenty of room for everyone if someone isn’t leaning all round it

Tourists fuddle the smooth transition across hall at the top of the escalators at kings cross, standing still or heading cross trajectories.

At the Piccadilly line platform a crowd round the open door is an obstacle to getting on the remaining space.