My previous blog post focused on the hustle and bustle of
Central London in a positive manner; barely a month later and we’re experiencing
something so eerie, frightening and unprecedented that it’s the sort of thing
you wake up to and think, wow, why did I dream that and why didn’t I think it
was rubbish and wake up? But you don’t, do you. The only time this has happened
– and it’s still vague and probably doesn’t count anyway – is when I had one of
those naked in public dreams (yeah I still get those) and at a public gathering
I felt so humiliated that I actually remember saying or murmuring, ‘this had better
be a bloody dream’.
I guess one of the issues with coronavirus is the ‘not
knowing’ aspect and the helplessness of it all. But why did the UK dither for
so long? Right at the beginning of 2020 my partner called it; she told me about
a disease escalating at a rapid pace in China. She said, how would you feel if
we stocked up with food, drink and other essentials, isolate and work from home.
What, really? She warned that it would spread to Europe within weeks and yep,
she was right. Now, admittedly she is a virologist/bioinformatician, so has good
knowledge of how diseases spread but surely there are senior figures who work
with the government who would be on top of this.
The problem is, this dithering action reflects the lack of
leadership the UK has had over the past decade within the various governments
and senior figures and you have to question why plan Bs have been so conspicuous
by their absence, and why there is so much complacency. I could provide a timeline
from 2010 that would put all parties to shame but I’ve decided not to, except to say that we as a whole are not stupid
and predictions can never be safe: see Brexit, coalition governments, tactics
that backfire, etc.
On 12 December 2019 it was the company Christmas party in
Croydon. It was decent, much better than the previous one despite being at the
same venue, with a spicy buffet rather than bowl food. I could have partied all
night had it not been for the annoying generic DJ who played hip hop for most
of the night when all of us wanted ABBA, The Beatles, anthems from the 1980s
and 1990s and basically everything the guy wasn’t playing. Admittedly this is a
guess but the average age at the party was somewhere in the region of 35 to 45,
for god’s sake.
So at about 10 pm I gave up and took the short walk to East
Croydon station. This was, of course, also the day of the General Election. I
sat down on the train to London Bridge and checked the exit poll. I sighed and
felt completely lost. For the first time ever I hadn’t voted for any of the top
three parties for various reasons. The only consolation was that my
constituency is one of the safest seats in the country, with the Labour MP
securing more than 70% of the vote, so it didn’t really matter.
On the train some youngsters were sitting in front of me.
They were Labour campaigners drenched in red and yellow and they looked so
upset that I felt like crying myself.
Covid-19 may be the tip of a melting iceberg but for me this country has been in a transitional period for a while. There is anger but with an
increasing feeling of unease, reluctant defeat and a desire to escape from it
all. Pet Shop Boys songs Into thin air and Dreamland are examples, and when the
usually fluffy pop act Saint Etienne write an angry song about moving to another planet, you know there’s a problem.
Technology is becoming increasingly influential and
humanised at a rapid rate. When you go to an airport as
big as Heathrow and the gates open via scanning a passport, when you have GP appointments online or on the phone, and when you turn on various lights and equipment
using speech rather than flicking a finger, you wonder what will happen next and why. Neil Hannon
of Divine Comedy mocks this in a song about an appointment with a psychotherapist being conducted by a robot. Then
there’s social media of course, although you could argue that the culture of
bitching and yelling has always existed but been kept behind closed brains.
Not that I’m a technophobe of course. As I write there’s a
laptop alongside me containing everything I need to work from home, and the web remains
an essential tool, especially when you are doing research or fact checking. I
wish I’d had that available when I interviewed the sadly deceased Gordon
Kaye for a UK Gold TV digital listings project 20 years ago. I asked
him a question based on him being best known for ‘Allo Allo’ and he seemed
miffed that I didn’t know he was in Coronation Street way before that. And of
course there’s the iPhone with the web at my fingertips; also essential for
ideas for blogs and poems when I’m on the bog.
The lockdown, self-isolation issues are horrible but maybe,
just maybe, once we can get a grip of this virus, society can get the kick up
the backside it needs. No more taking anything for granted for a start, no more
complacency and maybe the realisation that we human beings need each other more
than we think.
I’m as guilty as anyone. I don’t meet up with my friends and
family enough and that’s based on my own complacency. That’s been taken out of my hands for the
near future at least, as has football. I just assume that I can watch it or
play it when its available but that has frozen, as has Euro 2020. Funnily
enough the last time I took a proper journey outside was to a football session:
a competitive game but ultimately about 15-20 people from a mailing list playing
on a three-quarter-sized astroturf pitch at a school. As I journeyed to and
from the game, it had the ring of one of those World War films where a pilot
tells his family that he only has one mission left, then he would return home.
And then of course…
Usually there is a lot of banter at these football sessions. For
example, one week a player got absolutely panned when he mistakenly took his
daughter’s trousers as his post-game change of clothes rather than his own. But
the changing room was somewhat muted this time, other than post-match analysis of a 9-9
draw in which my team came back from 5-0 and 9-4 down with yours truly scoring
a last-gasp equaliser with a belter from 30 yards tap-in from three yards out (sorry, had
to mention that). No-one knew when we’d play again, although at least the
playing behind closed doors option wouldn't be an issue. It was ‘see you mate’ rather than ‘see
you next week’, which was reciprocated.
Now it’s about patience. Football doesn’t matter, it’s all about
helping one another to survive, worshipping the NHS for the incredible work
that doctors and nurses are doing to save lives while risking their own, and
praying that scientific research and testing makes enough of a breakthrough to
gradually restore relatively normal day-to-day life soon. Oh, and it would allow me to get
a bloody haircut.
