Lockdown - Being Prepared

We're nearing the end of the first week of lockdown here in the UK, and it's been an undeniably odd, yet weirdly normal, week. I think most people, faced with a crisis, want to do something, anything, in the hope that they're being useful. Staying in, doing nothing, doesn't seem quite right, but this time it is. For some of us, though, it's not really anything new, and chatting to folk on social media I've come to realise that my habits, my lifestyle, what I read and watch on TV and film, and even the last few personally awful years have readied me for this eventuality in a way I couldn't have predicted.

Apocalypse Now! I've read so many books, and watched so many films, from Albert Camus' La Peste to Simon Pegg/Edgar Wright's Shaun of the Dead, in which people have to battle against old-fashioned plague or a new previously unknown virus (Camus is admittedly a little more interested in people's emotional and intellectual response than actual zombie killing, but they all deal with survival against something deadly)  I've worked out where the characters' plans have gone wrong, and have a much better plan of what I'd do if and when the inevitable struck. I've always said that come the zombie apocalypse, the place for supplies isn't a supermarket, or looting a deserted TV/computer store but a camping-supplies shop - they'll have water purification tablets, those self-heating meals, an all-gimmicks army knife, a hatchet (you never know when it could be useful) and Kendal Mint Cake for a treat. That plan hasn't honestly proved really useful in the current situation, but 'don't go out, or, if you desperately need supplies and must leave your safe place, keep a distance from other people' is straight out of the apocalypse survival guide. There's no going down the Winchester this time, but we can all stay home, have a nice cup of tea, and wait for it all to blow over. (Watch Simon Pegg and Nick Frost show you how here)

On a more sensible, practical level, my food cupboard was stocked (it always is), and the freezer still full of last year's allotment pickings. My daughter always says I always shop as if we're three days ahead of the zombie apocalypse; for once it's been a useful trait. I've tried to make sense of this habit  - my mother was in her 20s during WW2 rationing and I suspect that afterwards she never allowed her larder to run empty, during my teen years of the 70s industrial action disrupted supplies - bread, butter, sugar - and the first year I was married heavy snow cut us off from our local shops for days. All of these things I think have influenced me, but whatever the reason, it's certainly proved helpful these last weeks. Other people may run down to their last tin of baked beans, but not me; I'd be uncomfortable and re-stocking long before that. When crunch time came I didn't have to go out panic-buying, and that online delivery slot for three weeks time is fine.

In many ways I'm used to being alone a lot of the time. Apart from a brief period long, long ago, I've been a stay-at-home mum, seguing straight into early retirement, and swapping my school-gate chats to social media twitterings. I have virtual friends who I'll talk to most days, but catching up with 'real' people is much rarer. I'm not quite a hermit but I'm quite content to potter about doing my usual everyday things round the house and garden without seeing anyone; getting used to having another person around all day when my husband took early retirement was odd.

As this lockdown continues I'll definitely miss days out in the countryside, or gigs and theatre trips, but I can manage without for a while because I've had to do it before. Four, maybe five, years ago my parents' health took a downturn, and, although not involved in their day to day care, keeping an eye on them became a priority; evenings out were cancelled, plans with my daughters dropped, I never dared stay away for more than a night, and even that became an impossibility after a while. After months of mourning, just as I was thinking about taking holidays again, the media started talking about corona virus and social distancing. At first I was frustrated that life had to be put on hold again, but I'm used to it now.



So, here I am, resigned to fate, and staying in for the next couple of weeks, possibly months. Normal life will more or less continue for me without drastic changes - just more family video chats, and more social media chattering.