With my mental health currently even more unstable than it usually is, I like to get out for my one little bit of exercise that the government allows me every day. I’m being furloughed with my full consent at the moment so I am spending even more time at home than usual. Mostly, I don’t mind that. I can slip into my little Man Cave, write stuff, read stuff, drink coffee, listen to the radio, watch telly and be relatively content. Following some of the events of this weekend, I am wondering whether even this little walk is going to be taken away from me.
I follow much the same route every day, culminating in a walk along the upper level of the near deserted car park at Bristol Parkway station where I might hang around and watch a few ghost trains come and go. It feels so strange, so eerie, but then, so it should. If it felt normal, I would probably not have been paying attention.
I see very few people when I am on my walk and the few I do see usually ensure they adhere to social distancing. My mind can wander a little. I can think of stuff to write about, I can daydream of a brighter day, not that it wasn’t bright today. In fact, it was bright and sunny and even slightly warm, always a mood lifter for me. One of my biggest fears at the moment is that they will take my little walk away.
The scenes around parts of the country were completely bonkers over the weekend. In particular, London parks were packed with people socialising and, god forbid, sunbathing. What part of ‘Stay at home, protect the NHS, save lives’ do they not understand?
I saw the TV pictures and thought to myself, they could be killing people. And health secretary, Matt Hancock, whose stock has unexpectedly risen considerably in recent days, was livid at the government’s daily press briefing. “Those fucking idiots. If they don’t stop acting like twats, I’ll fucking make you stay indoors. Bastards.” (I am not sure these were the exact words, but you get my drift.)
So, not only are these cretinous idiots partying in public parks, potentially murdering people, they are also inadvertently doing their best to take away one of our very last bastions of freedom. My little daily walk.
It’s not even like I can go out jogging because of tendonitis in my knee and the reoccurrence of a back injury from nearly 40 years ago or even cycling and to be fair if I have another terrorist jogger or terrorist cyclist glide silently past me at high speed on the pavement, I might not be responsible for my actions, although that’s another story. I just want to walk for a little while to maintain what’s left of my sanity.
This Covid-19 stuff is becoming one of the worst things in my life although to the best of my knowledge I haven’t had it yet. I’m resigned to spending the rest of the spring and summer stuck mostly between these four walls. I’ll be well pissed off if the irresponsible actions of a minority of morons takes away my one chance of getting out of the house.
