Dear LPG,

We all have good habits and bad habits when we are young and, while some of us keep them up as we get older, others let them slide.   It is also a fact that our standards change as time goes by and when it comes to observing many aspects of the daily routines that we have lived by for so long, Covid-19 has played havoc with them as we continue to have no need to hurry.

I think that many of our youngsters have been forced to maintain their daily routines or forge alternative ones because they are, by now, having to do ‘key work’, or work from home while their very young one’s battle with online schooling schedules.  I imagine that just taking care of them, the business of affording to live and making sure that the young minds are kept occupied must force those young mums and dads who don’t live alone to soldier on.  

I am not sure, however, if they really understand what it is like when you are perhaps living alone and adjusting to a life where there is even less to do than usual.  I started writing this having been inspired by my net curtains. They are in need of a day in the washing machine and my windows could do with a bit of spit and polish as well.  I am lucky enough to still be able to do such little jobs for myself and I make plans to every single morning when I finally get up and make that first cup of tea, sit at the table and glance up from whatever bit of information I have stumbled upon on my tablet to check what the weather is like.  It is then that I look out of the window to check the accuracy of the online version of the weather and remember the state of those curtains.

This has been a part of my daily routine for far too long now, and it is followed by the recurring thought which tells me that I could get on with it today, but then I think about the fact that there is no real hurry, no one is coming to visit and there is always tomorrow for the curtains, but yesterday I found an old LPG posting which stopped me in my tracks. (►►►) It talks about the advantages of a three diary system which will help you to make a record of daily achievements and actually achieve them.

Reading the article got me thinking about long ago when I was a mum who worked full time and looked after a couple of young children.  I used to take a day off to do the windows a couple of times a year and they would get done because otherwise I would have to waste another day’s holiday on the job, and I think that that thought woke me up a bit and yesterday morning, I actually finished my tea, got the whites down and got stuck in. 

I looked up from this morning’s cuppa and the view through the windows is much better although I don’t think that any visitors would really notice, even if there were going to be any today. 

The truth is that many of us older citizens are suffering from more than being lonely and depressed as we continue to be locked down; we are also suffering from ‘procrastination-itis’.

My grubby net curtains got me rethinking my daily routine, but I suspect that there are many such little jobs that many of us are swerving.  So my message today offers a reminder of that earlier post which suggests that we get up, make a plan and get on with it just a bit more as the spring’s better weather begins to make its presence felt.

DP, Lewisham