Sunday, March 29, 2020

dreaming of a pint, balance, blaring banners, support groups, as positively as possible



Out of the bitter wind, the sun was hot. Sitting at the top of the garden, sipping a bottled beer, was great - lovely to be outside for a bit - but I miss draught. Sounds like it will be quite a while before pints can be enjoyed again. There are times when staying home is fun but other times when the enormity of what is happening is almost overwhelming.

Though I do wonder at the value of publishing daily shifts in modelling in the papers as headlines. In the Saturday Times some messages were relatively upbeat, in the Sunday Times, unremittingly bleak. Only deep into this evening's latest cataclysmic article, do you find a voice of balance that says we won't know the effect of the current measures for two weeks. Hopefully it will show that the drastic steps are working. As with news generally, subtleties of interpretation and argument get lost beneath blaring banners. And surely buoying people up, then dragging them under again risks having a negative impact on national mental health.

Amazing, though, the support groups springing up, whether in the village for those self-isolating, or online, such as Writers in Oxford keeping local authors in touch.

And if the evidence of behaviour in the village is typical, everyone is taking staying at home and social distancing very seriously. People doing their best and trying to keep going as best they can, and as positively as possible.

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