Little Ole Me



CoVID-19 Day 32

I’ve been writing this diary for over a month now and I’m conscious I’ve largely spoken of my feelings and my reaction to news and events but not gone into great detail about what my day consists of. So here goes:

I was awake aound 5.30 this morning and was onto Twitter and Facebook before writing up yesterday’s entry on my iPhone. Writing this takes up a fair bit of time so I didn’t get up till after 7am. I wasn’t writing for all that time, however, I did grab the odd bit of shut eye. So I got up, grabbed myself some cereal and a cup of tea, tarted up what I’d written, copied it to my personal blog and put links in my Facebook timeline and one of my pages.

I then got on to working on a client’s website (that I built) for whom I also do customer support. I was working on improving the website’s visibility on Google, hoping to drive more traffic to it. We had an online meeting at 9am with the website being the main talking point. Afterwards I carried on with what I was doing which took me through to late afternoon. A Zoom meeting was scheduled for 6pm where our Big Local group would be discussing our role in the Coronavirus crisis hitting our town.

Big Local groups were set up by a charity called Local Trust which gets its money directly from the National Lottery. Our area was chosen to receive £1 million and our group was created to deliver that to community groups and businesses in the area. I was voted in as chair person 15 months ago even though I didn’t put my name forward (you had to opt out rather than in). I had never done anything like this and never saw myself as a chair yet the very first meeting I chaired I managed to introduce new etiquette into the meetings. 2019 was a tumultuous year with deep divisions in the partnership nearly breaking it apart. I managed to steer it through those trouble waters with the help of colleagues and we came out stronger for it.

At around 2pm I had a conversation with our community development worker ahead of the meeting before getting back to the website. I completed that work by 5pm and played my guitar until the meeting. The meeting went very well and we have some exciting stuff coming up — I’m looking forward to being instrumental in helping the community at this difficult time. At 7.30 we closed the meeting, I made myself a cup of tea, listened to Stafford Live and did the clapping thing at 8pm, after which I put the bin collection out and took my daily exercise.

Stafford Live is one of these online open mics. Stafford is where I come from so I did a gig last weekend and enjoyed it. The guy who played tonight said he had some songs on Spotify so I looked him up. That got me to remembering I have some songs on Spotify so I looked myself up and played the album. I never pushed it at the time because I wasn’t sure how good it was after some luke warm reviews. But its actually pretty decent. There goes another opportunity I missed.

That’s not a typical day because I don’t have typical days. But none of it was unusual. So I’ve made myself another cup of tea and am finishing this off before retiring to my bed chamber. I did dabble in social media throughout the day but not to any great extent. I have no morals to pass on and won’t clutter this with external news, I’ll just bid you goodnight and stay safe. I just need an image to finish this off — and a title.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Ghost of Christmas Cancelled

I decided to work late into the night and complete something I promised I'd do over the last couple of days. At 11.30 I was really tired and a little cold. I wasn't sure whether to push on through the tiredness or lay down for a while and nap but gave in and lay beneath the duvet, fully clothed so that I didn't get too comfortable. At midnight my computer alerted me to the time but by now the drug of sleep had made getting up an unpleasant experience and I gave in and went back to bed. That too was unpleasant as I couldn't get comfortable and as I turned over a part of the bed was cold. I got up, went to the toilet, then made myself a cup of tea and a bowl of cereal and sat in front of my computer. I then, as is my habit these days, pictured what it was that I was feeling and the picture was of heading into a black tunnel - that tunnel being Christmas. There should be nothing frightening about Christmas - nothing traumatic has happened for me to associate it with blackn...
Read more

Length of a Jetty

My fingertips are cold but not as cold as my heart. How can there be so much noise yet it seems like there’s a deafening silence – tinnitus, white sound that drowns out all sounds of joy and peace but I can still hear the clock ticking and the traffic outside. Where is God in all this? When all the reasoning and words of encouragement have settled like house dust the air is clearer and lines and angles of the furniture and window frame are sharper and clearer. When chattering has ceased the sound of the house moving and settling reminds me that the earth moves. It doesn’t just remain static while humans take care of their busyness and God’s creatures go about theirs. The earth moves – very slowly, definitely, irresistibly taking no heed of our short and hurried lives. But I’m getting older and as long as I’m alive I will be swept down the river of life along with the detritus that brushes my shoulder and muddies my view. And the landmarks become memories as new horizons entice me and e...
Read more

Rocks and Hard Places

Image
I didn't get a Father's day card last year. I was fairly pragmatic. After all, its just a made up day and mostly geared to selling cards, gifts and generally sustaining our consumerist economy. If you're not hung over, bloated or broke after a big day then it can't have been that good, can it? I'm not heartless though. It did hurt a little. It must have, because I can remember how I felt. But piling misery on misery really doesn't have any beneficial effects so it's not good to dwell on these things. I got one this year and it feels worse. They say absence makes the heart grow fonder, which is true if you're on a promise. But when nearness is painful, distance is a mercy. When you're separated from your family by distance you can count the miles but when you're separated by regret the counting never stops. I'm on my own with a lovely Father's Day card in the window. It says "Thank you for everything." So I did something right b...
Read more