It’s been one month since I sat down to write a blog post which I never ended up finishing. It is nearly the end of June now; it is summer. The world is soft and green, stretching out like the perfect lawn in front of the perfect house, or else like a very fine afternoon, or a very soft blanket. I’m 29 now, and in a new relationship, and applying for a Masters program at the University of Edinburgh. I’ve also had one dose of the vaccine and sat in bars, bookshops, and restaurants. I’ve felt very happy, felt very confused, felt like I stood up for myself and then felt like I should have done a better job of it.
Continue reading “On Life Going On”Tag: Covid
Remembering
For the first time in forever, I went to a café. Going to a café is a very normal thing to do but even normal things become thrilling when you haven’t experienced them in a while. Sitting at that little table, I felt like an old person revisiting a childhood home or looking through photo albums and reliving distant memories. Things came back; I remembered.
Continue reading “Remembering”Coming Alive
It’s May, the most gentle month of the year. So far, it’s rained every day and I’m wearing a winter jacket again but I don’t care and neither does anybody else. It rained on my walk today, the type of rain that falls sideways and makes your hair stick to your face. I passed shops I had never seen before, saw signs of life in places that were once deserted. Chairs and tables have appeared in empty spaces. People, too, seemed to have sprung out of nowhere, their shapes visible behind glass windows where I once only saw my own reflection.
Continue reading “Coming Alive”Dinner Party
I have a dream. Covid restrictions are over, and we’re allowed to see people again, and I can host a dinner party. That’s it; that’s my dream. As soon as the world goes back to normal, I don’t want to jump on a plane and travel somewhere far away: I just want to have people over, and take their coats, and sit next to them in my living room, drinking wine and waiting for the moment to announce that dinner’s ready.
Continue reading “Dinner Party”Missing Pointless Things
I’ve decided that I miss talking to people about pointless things. I miss hearing their boring stories about what they didn’t do on the weekend. I miss being told their opinion of a restaurant they went to last night even though I never asked. I miss hearing about their kid’s birthday party, and about how the bus was late again, and about the new pair of shoes they bought on sale.
Continue reading “Missing Pointless Things”How Will History Remember Coronavirus?
I always think of history as something that doesn’t happen to me. Instead, history is something that happened a long time ago, something that I read about in textbooks, something that might have museums or memorials dedicated to it.
Continue reading “How Will History Remember Coronavirus?”