Fifteen months down and how many to go?
15 Jul 2021
Dear LPG,
It is still only mid-June 2021 while I am writing this. We were all going to get back to normal next week (June 21st) but I, and the rest of the country, have just heard the news that the lifting of lockdown restrictions has been postponed for another month. I have seen that some LPG writers have asked that their writings get posted a year after they are written but, with LPG’s help, I will settle for one month.
Looking back over the past fifteen months, I am sure that we pensioners will be the age group of people that will go down in history as those least affected practically by lockdown. Our pensions will not alter although I am sure that those who could get out and about before all this started, and have not been out since, will anticipate even more loneliness to come and have another month to psyche themselves up for that first excursion past the front door since this all started. But looking on the bright side, we will have a whole extra month to continue to practice all that phoning friends, watching television, eating too much and exercising too little, and catching up with all those things that we were going to do last March, when we first expected to be home for about six weeks.
The whole episode has been really rough on every age group but the people I really feel for are the workers of the world, many of which are our children and grandchildren. While it is easy to dismiss what the news broadcasts tell us, we have had a year to keep up with our own younger family members during their year of being home. We have seen their jobs affected as they have worked from home and tried to educate their school aged children. In the absence of the many things which would keep us busy otherwise, we have become so much more aware of them as we have watched their jobs come and go while they struggle through working from home and worrying about the future of their homes, jobs and financial existence. Those of us who are used to four weeks’ holiday at most, two of which we are used to spending away from home, are missing out on the healing effects of getting away from it all, and after all the false starts, this feels as if it will never end.
Before March 2020, I can remember so many of us craving a bit of escape from what always seemed to be the never-ending routine of this really busy world that we live in, but after a year of the lockdown experience, I have decided that even though I found the prospect of a six-week long holiday appealing fifteen months ago, that novelty has well and truly worn off now!
I know that we can only ultimately blame the pandemic for all this disruption to our lives, but it will be interesting to see if July 21st brings a real promise of freedom with it or if the goalposts are about to be moved again…
AN, Selhurst
