I spoke to Rosa this morning over FaceTime, as I normally do on the weekends when she isn’t visiting Dad. We generally chat about a variety of topics: school work, what her friends are up to, what’s on Netflix, how her cat is cuter than Clara’s cat, and so on. But this week there was a series of silences and a distinct feeling that there was nothing to talk about.
It's a similar story with the regular Zoom video conference calls I’ve set up with various groups of friends and family. At first it was novel and exciting to connect with people in this way and there was a lot to talk about. Two months later, it’s becoming a struggle to make conversation.
The problem is that, in the covid-19 lockdown, every day is much like every other day. Every week the same as the previous week. Time blurs into a monotonous continuum, where you start to lose track of which day of the week it is. Furthermore, because there are no markers in the calendar like holidays, or dinners with friends, or events at the school, you even start to lose track of the overall year. I was surprised to realise today that it’s a month already since my last blog post.
With all the monotony, little things take on more significance.
The highlight of this week was visiting the local recycling centre for the first time in several months, to deposit some garden waste and some old clothes. Even Clara was excited.
“How was it?” she asked as soon as I walked through the door.
“Well,” I enthused, “there are two guys manning the gate, who check the car registration against their checklist of bookings and then let you in. Once inside there are three more men supervising, though I was the only person there. There are four parking spaces and lots of signs giving instructions about social distancing. It was quite exciting but also a nice experience given that I had the place to myself. Apart from the five council employees…”
With emptying the bins being about the most interesting event to look forward to, it's easy to become lethargic in this sort of lockdown situation, and start to let life drift by without really realising. Over the last couple of months I’ve relapsed into playing a lot of online Scrabble again – harmless enough but a pretty big waste of time. I feel it’s something of a lost opportunity.
I recently started looking for useful things to do, but preferably ones that don’t involve starting at a screen for hours on end – I get enough of that from work.
So, I built a new garden shed (from a flatpack) a few weeks back, which kept me busy for a couple of days. And last time Rosa was here, we did some cheesemaking.
Making cheese is sort of like magic. For soft cheese, take milk and mix in a tiny tablet of rennet (an enzyme, originally found in sheep stomachs but that now comes in vegetarian form). Then heat at just the right temperature for half an hour and watch the cheesy curds separate from the watery whey. Take the curds, add citric acid, herbs and salt depending on the type of cheese, allow to set, and you’re done. So far we’ve made mozzarella, ricotta, Scottish crowdie and some delicious halloumi (the latter using creamy Jersey cows’ milk).
I think keeping busy like this is particularly important with Parkinson’s. Not only does it keep you sane, it makes life more rewarding.
But most of all: as I am struggling to type with painful hands now, I am reminded that I only have a few “active” years left. And I really don’t want to give one of them away for free to Covid-19.
