Like the Clappers


CoVID-19: Day 18
 
It's clapping day and it feels odd but that’s just me. It feels anonymous because there is no one taking a bow at the end of our street or being presented with an award or finishing a presentation. But then sometimes someone is called to the front (quite unexpected for them) and praised and the onlookers called to clap so I guess that’s what we’re doing. Except that doesn’t fully satisfy my disquiet. These frontline workers didn’t sign up for heroism or to be asked to go into situations for which they were not given adequate support and I want to say sorry but a clap doesn’t seem appropriate for that. Having raised this question publicly I found that the clapping was appreciated by many and not seen as a hollow gesture and no one came back to me who questioned the applause.

the whole corona crisis has become a behemoth
that crushes its heroes and elevates it villains

And its Good Friday tomorrow. I never did get totally into the Good Friday thing but then I’ve never been ito special days, even anniversaries. If someone died 12 months ago today they died on 9th April 2019. The only connection that has with today is the solar cycle. Its not that I’m callous — I mourn like everyone else — its just that the date isn’t a trigger for me and I can’t invent the feeling. And Jesus wasn’t crucified 2020 years ago tomorrow anyway. Maybe I’m missing a community gene. Is it a form of sociopathy?

So moving seamlessly from doctors and nurses to pulses, I’m cooking up the pulses I soaked last night with added bits and pieces. Then on the Easter theme, I’ve decided to have pancakes this evening. It would be fitting to bake bread on Sunday, as that’s when Jesus rises, but I have no yeast.

Pancakes were great. The smoke alarm thought so too. Now to finish this entry but I’m feeling neither angst nor elation, just a bit of doldrums which is the strangest feeling because I’m pretty sure my anxiety levels must still be at least at amber alert. I’m wondering how many people are finding the crisis and the social isolation numbing, if only because the usual stimuli, routines and social encounters are absent.

So rather than whitter on — my well has truly dried up — I’ll close here. The politics is getting to me and the whole corona crisis has become a behemoth that crushes its heroes and elevates it villains. So nothing new there.

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