Sometimes you don’t notice what’s missing until it comes back.
I hadn’t really noticed how odd it was to not see children outside until the UK largely returned to face-to-face schooling a couple weeks ago. I was on a cool down walk at the end of my run when – for the first time in a long time – I saw parents walking their kids to school.
It felt like the city had taken a deep breath. The first since late December, when the UK went back into lock-down, despite the government just days prior saying “canceling Christmas” would be inhumane and wasn’t an option on the table.
Last week – just over a year since the initial lock-down order – outdoor gatherings of six people (or two households) became permitted again. As the widely circulating meme cast it – now you and five friends could get drunk in a park.
We had a couple over and sat chatting on the chilly but sunny patio, drinking rosé and willing it to be warmer than it actually was. It was great to see other people again, and Dawnise and I were both pretty exhausted when they left, only a few hours later.
We might have forgotten how to socialize.
This coming Monday non-essential retail can reopen, and restaurants and pubs can serve customers outdoors (still subject to the so-called “rule of six”). When the weather cooperates we’ll consider venturing out to eat something we didn’t cook and wasn’t delivered by a dude (and it’s nearly always a dude) on a scooter.
Barring a spike in acute disease, that will be the regime until mid May.
Things otherwise are largely unchanged. We’ve marked six months in our “new” apartment – no leaks or other major issues to speak of.
Dawnise was invited for her first vaccination a few weeks back – just before the UK shifted to mostly administering second doses. I look forward to getting mine “soon.”
My phone tells me that in the year since I geared up to run in the cold I’ve run 770km – about 480 miles in old money. I’ve replaced my shoes once, and when the temperature got down near freezing I supplemented the wool base layer with a windbreaker, hat and gloves. I only skipped a handful of days, when it was icy, or driving rain. I still can’t say I like running, but the routine has become part of how I mark the passing of time. Like ordering more coffee, or coffee filters.
My practical driving exam, scheduled for December, was canceled due to the Christmas lock-down, and rescheduled to early May – which seemed impossibly far off. I got email the other day saying that testing has been set to resume, and that my test is expected to proceed as scheduled. If it does, and assuming I pass, it will be 10 months since I applied for my provisional license.
Fingers crossed.