Yesterday, Sunday 5th April, felt like another day of milestones. The temperature reached 21 degrees, the Queen delivered her address to the nation and our Prime Minister Boris Johnson got admitted to hospital with Covid19.
There was a lot of apprehension building up in official quarters about the warm weather expected on the weekend. It had been explicitly addressed in the live national update throughout the week, and people had started encouraging others on social media to ignore the sunshine and stay home. We were all reminded that to linger in public spaces would be a direct insult to the memories of the two NHS nurses who had died that week after contracting Covid-19 from their patients. Their names were Areema Nasreen and Aimee O’Rourke. Both were in their 30s. Even with this news, people flooded parks on Saturday to sunbathe – a definite ‘non-essential’ activity under the lockdown rules. In South London, Brockwell Park had to be closed, as over 3000 people (even more than usual?!), crammed in for some leisurely time in the sun. WTF.
A general air of disbelief and condemnation on various forms of media resulted in a lower turnout on Sunday. At first I felt like a middle class prick complaining about how selfish people were being (due to having some private outdoor space), but then I thought nah, you could easily go for a lovely walk for an hour or so, basking in the full glory of the sun, without parking up and getting out your fucking picnic basket in literal clusters of disease all over this park.
I was feeling quite sensitive; I woke up in a great mood on Sunday but then the heavily black-eyelinered girl who lives upstairs with her seemingly chill boyfriend aired me when I said a cheery “hello!” out the front. They, as a couple, inexplicably dislike Jack and I, and it hurts my feelings. When your world has become quite small it’s easy to become neurotic about these things, and I had planned out about 5 different notes to slip under their door, offering to make sure we didn’t go in the garden too much, asking them if there’s anything they want us to change, offering them an abundance of vegetables from the vege patch (which they have already approved of). In the end, I happened to walk out the front and actually inspect the rubbish that was littering the front wall-garden thingy (I don’t know how to explain it), that the landlord had mentioned was a bone of contention with the neighbours, but that Jack had sworn was not anything of our making. As I was filling the garden waste bin, I recognised the random bits of detritus as various bits of packaging from our meals over the last, say, 2 months. Basically, we cleaned it up and lo, our neighbours waved at us through the window today! I guess we were the assholes.
I was in a spontaneous Houseparty call when the Queen’s address aired at 8pm Sunday. Jack was deeply involved in some design work when I watched it later on my phone and didn’t notice when I started crying. I’m not a monarchist, but the fact that it was only the fifth time the Queen had addressed the nation really drove it home that we are living in extraordinary times. I’ve never felt more British than when she spoke of “self-discipline”, “quiet, good-humoured reserve” and “fellow-feeling,” Interesting that language more geared towards fostering discipline and adhesion to rules was used over more ‘battle’ oriented vocabulary which would incite a spirit of rebellion against the virus (and therefore maybe misdirected to local authority).
If you had ever told me the Queen would be reassuring the nation about a pandemic, I would never have believed you. The moment she mentioned speaking to the children who had been sent away during WW2 for their own safety, I was hit with a wave of emotion. Those poor children…but also, how could I be getting reassured by the same woman?! In the same lifetime. I imagine everyone in the world is having these ironically surreal moments of clarity, that are at once wholly relatable but entirely unique.
I received the news immediately after my delayed viewing of the speech that Boris Johnson had been admitted to hospital. As he had already been mildly ill with a confirmed case of the virus for around 10 days, I believed reports that he had only been admitted for routine tests. However, tonight we found out that he’s been moved to the Intensive Care Unit. There’s some chat of Russian media reporting that he is on a ventilator, which has been wholly denied by the UK. He is supposedly conscious, non-ventilated and still our Prime Minister. Not the one I voted for, but a person who symbolises so much right now. If the Queen provides us with the steady perspective of someone who has ruled for the better part of a century, then Boris John’s fate is a stark lesson in the fickleness of privilege.
Figs Ahoy 