2021

 

Its around this time of year that my wife comes home from work with gifts and an indication that the year is coming to a close. My wife is customer facing as a receptionist where there are lots of regular customers and there tends to be generosity this time of year. Above for example is a box of 35 Tunnock's tea cakes which is not cheap. That was just one of the gifts. I feel I should send them down to my uncle in East Anglia as he misses some things from home despite being away for all the time I have known him. I'm not sure if its these of the wafers he misses though so maybe I'll have to eat them myself. When my brother was down earlier in the year he took some Stornaway black budding. My gran used to take down Lorne sausage, potato scones, shortbread and other things I forget know. That was though a time when things were hard to get, a different world. Nowadays there is very little you cannot get if you want it and have the funds. Makes me think of my first holiday abroad at Palma Nova and newspapers were always so a day or two out of date which is very different from now where you can get them with a click instantly on your phone. I digress.

I can't remember all the gifts my wife got but she did well and as I said it indicates the end of the year. It goes too quickly. 2021 has shot by like a rocket in much the same way as 2020 did. I see I am over the half century now and my wife is a few years ahead of me. Two girls at 18 and 16 with the boy turning 14 in a month's time. It is scary. But the feelings are mixed. I am sure I am not the only one who could not wait to see the back of this year- and last. It has been 2 years of misery for everyone and we can only hope that if not for ourselves then the generations below the future years are better. Right now no one can tell and that is the hardest thing.

I relate everything to myself. In that regard I feel its very like my first full blown panic attack which had me unable to go out the door. That was incredibly scary. Not only did I not know what was wrong with me but I could find no one to help me. It was, and still is, a very lonely place. More than that though was the uncertainty of the future. I did not know if I would ever get better. I didn't know if things were ever going to be the same again. Two years on almost from the beginning of Covid19 we are all still feeling the same way. There is fear around every corner and the future is really unknown. I am not recovered but I see many people who are recovered- many, many people. I feel even after all this time I can still recover too because I have had a taste of it. Likewise many deadly viruses have brought the world to a stop over time and every time the human race has bounced back. I don't see this time being any different. Like myself it may take longer than hoped but when the destination is reached it will bring with it an appreciation that has been earned and a resiliance that will make the time after better than those who never went through it. 

Setting

The year is setting like the sun above ever so slowly. My wife decided after being up North at the weekend to see her Octogenarian dad with the kids that they would not be returning to school. They all plan to spend Christmas and New Year up there so potentially exposing them to the new strain in that period when all they would be doing is watching videos and hanging about didn't seem wise. So it felt like the year closed earlier than normal as it also meant kids were up later and rising later. It has in effect felt like a string of weekends tied together. And for my part the year has also set as I have done very little and plan to do even less. I do though have further plans beyond that for the new year as we all no doubt do but mine involve establishing a routine which is missing in my life rather than specific goals.

For some reason on the day I turned 50 I felt the need to wear a shirt and dress a bit smarter. So I donned the first day with a shirt I had never worn and a jumper I had not worn either. Smartened up. And at one point that day the dog found something he should not have had. He wasn't for giving it up. I got a few dog biscuits and threw them down the hall with the hope being he would get them, I would shut the door behind him and remove the problem. But he is smart. He looked at where the treats were tossed, looked at me and then just launched at me. Shirt and jumper were binned as he ripped holes in both and I was left wondering what would have happened had I only been wearing one layer. He never learns. I got the hoover out, turned it on and that was enough to scare him off. I removed the problem and then he appeared with ears back and tail wagging like he had not seen me for weeks. Bizarre but coming an all too familiar routine. Still a new shirt and jumper needed binned.

It did though get me thinking about getting into a routine to organise my day. I have noted a few men of a certain age lately needing their routine of a shave, a wash, dressing and going for a paper or down somewhere for coffee or breakfast. A read. A walk. A shop. That kind of thing. The opposite of getting up and lounging about in PJs because there is no need not to. Routine is more important than I think I realised in my own life at least.

Anyway given we are all supposed to stay indoors when we can there has not been much else going on at the moment. I would expect that to be the case well into the new year. 
 

Omicron

 Today was the last day of isolation but not until midnight after this post is written. Its been a bit strange and a bit quick. I didn't mention it last time as it only occurred after. Around 10 days ago I suppose I was sitting alone at home with the dog on a Sunday and meanwhile my wife was up North taking her dad to a Christmas thing at the Church and the two younger kids were with them up in the choir loft. All good. Except sometime between then and Friday past someone tested positive for the new Omicron strain and that person was in the choir. My wife and kids being in close proximity had to isolate for 10 days from the event and so did I and the oldest being in the same household. But we only found out on Friday so its not been a long prison term. Thankfully although we have isolated we developed no symptoms. I think we avoided that one and thankfully my wife's dad avoided it too. He didn't have to isolate as he had covid within the 10 days (not sure of the official timeframe) prior to the incident at church. We have definitely been lucky on that score. 

This new variant is a big concern though. I said it to my wife last week when a couple of cases became 5 then 11 and then 25 and so on. Its how it went with the original Covid19 outbreak and this is supposed to be more contagious. That is a big worry. A big worry for the health service who are already under enough pressure as it is and for businesses who could be heading again into a period of closure they may not survive this time. I see the lockdowns at differing degrees in Austria, Germany and Holland mainly through football it has to be said but cannot help thinking we should be doing the same now. In fact last week it should have been done or earlier. We are not learning from this. If its 1 on day 1, 2 on day 2, 4 on day 3, 8 on day 4 then by the end of the week 1 is 64 and a week later its 8192, and so on. You have to stop at source surely! This weekend in Scotland we have a football cup final where over 50,000 people will attend. At the Hydro venue there are big events with lots of people attending. Restaurants, pubs, clubs and other venues like the Irn Bru Carnival which will be starting soon will see droves of people mingle. Airports will condense people of varying biological states into small places to spread around the country while trains, taxis, ferries and all the rest with do similar. Am I missing something? I know its not the popular thing to do and that is the probable reason the FM (that is First Minister rather than Fanny Merchant but those lines are as hard to define as the difference between an alligator and a crocodile) doesn't want to make the right call. Do we wait for it to get too bad to ignore before we do something? 

Time will tell. I do hope my concerns are false and soon we go back to normal. Not for me but for the kids who can seem to get a run at life without some sore of covid obstacle threat. The kids need a clearer future when what we have at present. For me its no different really. An excuse to stay indoors is an excuse not to be different for once. Its what I do and what I have done but even at 50 hope it won't be forever. But who knows? I have just lay out on the sofa reading books mostly and noting world events. Sorry to read of the deaths of both Mike Nesmith and Anne Rice who had impacts on my life in different ways but that is the way of it. At midnight tonight the cell door opens again and I must start getting out again more regularly and looking for a life before it passes me by. 

The big five-oh

 Everyone is different and deals with aging differently. In my own case I have not felt anything negative over the years. When I was a teenager I thought 30 was old but not when I was 21, I thought 40 was old. And at 30 I thought 50 was old, at 40 it was 60. For whatever reason though at 50 I feel 50 is old. I don't know why exactly. I lot of people I see that seemed a lot older than me are suddenly not and yet there has always been the same gap. I feel more aged and look more aged. I see changes that for the years previous I did not. And this led to a lot of unexpected anxiety on the eve of turning 50. Bordering on panic. Must like other anxiety inducing things in my life I just wanted it over with and when it was all calmed. I build things up in my head. 

I have started looking at other people's ages I thought were well older than me. People in the public eye. As I said I have found they are not that much older. Of my friends I am the second to hit the half centuary but it passed without mention such is the way of things. One of my friends had his birthday last year in lockdown and the rest are next year. Most are planning big things that I will not attend and maybe that is why my own is not on their minds. But that is OK. I needed it to pass quietly and it did. 

Last days of the forties

 The final throws of my 4th decade are ending pretty much the same way as the third. Two days remain of being in my forties and I wonder where the time has gone. I once looked at a young family and now see adults and in between was some kind of accelerated time. It doesn't feel like a decade but the afterburners of time keep burning, its not slowing down.