Category Archives: Op-eds

Enjoying yesterday’s sunshine

To shop or not to shop?

Should we be buying non-essential items at the moment? On the one hand, continuing our shopping habits (but online of course) helps to save jobs and keep our economy floating. On the other hand, should we be asking people to work outside the home to create, pick and deliver goods to the nation? What is the ethical position on this?

The Government advice to consumers has not be clear, so I posed it as a question to my Facebook friends. And I learned that businesses have been told “Online retail is still open and encouraged.” But it took me quite a bit of searching to find the primary source of that quote, which is bizarrely in an article headed Further businesses and premises to close: guidance (23rd March).

In full it says:

Takeaway and delivery services may remain open and operational in line with guidance on Friday 20 March. Online retail is still open and encouraged and postal and delivery service will run as normal.

It’s a pity that hasn’t been conveyed clearly to us, the consumers.

City Hall, London

I am really enjoying writing this diary. It takes me back to the time when I was blogging every day as a councillor. I have been worried that it might be seen as self-indulgent, but friends have urged me to continue, so I will.

There are many benefits of writing about my life, especially during this time. It helps me to process what has been happening to me and to the world around me. I am determined to remain cheerful, and the very act of looking for good things to write about each day lifts my mood.

Keeping a diary would be just as beneficial even if it wasn’t being published and shared so widely. And although I naturally turn to writing as a way of expressing myself, I could just as well have kept a video diary or created a podcast.

So why not try it yourself? You can post on Facebook to share with friends, or you can email out your thoughts to friends and family on a regular basis, or you can set up a YouTube channel or share on Instagram. If you prefer, you can simply keep a private diary and not share it with anyone else. Some people recommend handwriting a diary as it slows things down and gives you time to think.

Just take time to reflect on and process each day.

After yesterday’s orchids here is a picture of rubbish

This lockdown will have come as a real shock to some people, even though many saw it coming. When we decided to go into self-isolation we had two or three days to prepare ourselves, not only in terms of getting in food and other necessities, but also psychologically. Moreover, it was something we chose to do, rather than being forced on us. Today many, many people will suddenly, and perhaps unexpectedly, find themselves isolated and frightened.

For some families this period will be fraught. Younger children had been shielded from the rising sense of panic, but are now having to come to terms with it. They are angry, bewildered, scared, missing their friends and full of excess energy. Parents may feel worried because they are unable to meet their children’s educational needs.

But for most of us it’s not all that bad, if you can put aside the constant anxiety.

Here are some of the blessings…

Friends and members of your wider family, some of whom you have not heard from for a while, will contact you. If they don’t, then contact them yourself. My brother lives in Canada and we are now on a weekly Skype, whereas before we tended to email. My cousin phoned me yesterday from Australia. It has brought us all closer together.

You can now get on with all those projects that you had been putting aside until you had the time. That could mean culling old documents (I found bank statements from 1998), clearing out cupboards, sorting out wardrobes, having a good go at the garden, writing your memoirs, starting an art or craft project, reading those books you had always intended to read, even putting books into alphabetical order.

You can be creative with your cooking. Some ingredients may be unavailable but this is a good chance to try some new techniques or be inventive with what you have got. My son told me that he had made pizzas with naan bread, and it worked very well!

Just a photo to cheer you up. Orchid Festival, Kew Gardens 2019

You can find previous Isolation diaries here.

I haven’t been sleeping too well recently. I don’t suffer from classical insomnia, but I have been waking up very early and then finding I’m unable to go back to sleep. So I have been taking a nap in the afternoon, but it would be so much easier if I could get a good night’s sleep. I can’t really complain, and I’m having a much easier time of it than many others, but clearly the general anxiety is getting to me.

Mark Blackburn, who is my fellow admin on the Lib Dems in self-isolation Facebook group, has given this advice on the use of social media:

One, maybe stay away from Twitter and use FB more. Twitter tends to exaggerate and sensationalise, and can be pretty scary. Anything useful there appears somewhere else soon anyway. FB you still need to be a bit selective about, avoiding some of the generic stuff, but obviously groups like this and similar local-based ones can be very useful and supportive!

I don’t use Twitter much but the second piece of advice struck home. So I am now trying to avoid the news from 7pm each evening. Let’s see if that helps.

You can find previous Isolation diaries here.

On a normal Sunday I would go to church, so today is another rather strange one for me. However this is a strangeness that I share with millions of others, not just those in isolation.

My vicar has been recording short services each morning and uploading them to the church’s Facebook page. I have then been embedding them in the church website so people can follow them at any time of day, whether or not they are on Facebook. Today he did a special service for Mothering Sunday.

So this morning I had a choice between listening to Sunday Worship on Radio 4 led by the Archbishop of Canterbury, watching the service from my own church on Facebook, and viewing the BBC1 service televised from St David’s Cathedral (which is a bit of a special place for me). In the end I dropped into all three.

My church has also set up a team ready to help those in self-isolation and other vulnerable people in the community. In fact, as I was writing this a friendly church member contacted us to ask if there was anything we need.

I’m sure that synagogues, mosques, temples, gurdwaras and other places of worship across the country are doing very similar things – moving their services online and reaching out to support, not just their members, but also their wider communities. It would be good to hear about their initiatives.

You can find previous Isolation diaries here.

A friend of mine dropped an envelope through my door a couple of days ago. Inside was a bar of chocolate and a postcard with a photo of a place we loved visiting in Ireland. She wished us well and offered to do any shopping we needed. Of course, I phoned her to thank her and we had a very pleasant chat about this and that. It was a simple act of kindness which meant a lot.

My neighbours text and phone from time to time as well to see if we are OK. We haven’t had to call on any outside help so far, but it is so reassuring to know that there are people we can contact if we need anything.

I expect many of you will have come across #viralkindness. I run the weekly email newsletter that we send out to all our members, supporters and non-member volunteers in Kingston, so I started pushing out the ViralKindness pdf to everyone as soon as it popped up last weekend.

You do have to be a bit cautious about using it because some fraudsters have been abusing the community goodwill. But if you are still out and about then it would mean a lot to drop it through the door of elderly and vulnerable neighbours. I suggest adding a photo and some details about yourself so the person receiving it can recognise you and be more confident about responding.  Whatever you do – even if you are a councillor – do NOT do it in political mode (as some Labour activists have been doing). This is about friendship and community, not about chasing votes.

You can find previous Isolation diaries here.

I loved those clips of Italians singing from their balconies.

Traditionally we Brits don’t display the lack of self-consciousness about singing that the Italians enjoy – and we don’t have the balconies either.

But singing with others has grown hugely in popularity over the last 10 years or so, largely inspired by Gareth Malone and his projects that use singing to build communities. Choirs have popped up everywhere, and you don’t need to read music or even sing very well in order to take part.

Like many I am going to miss singing with others during isolation. But that changed yesterday evening. The musical director of my choir put a video on YouTube for us and encouraged us all to watch it at 8pm, our usual rehearsal time. In the video he played a recording of one of the pieces we had been working on and conducted us through it. So I, along with many of my choir friends, sang ‘Zadok the Priest’ at full volume in our separate homes, at roughly the same time. Of course, we couldn’t hear each other but it was great knowing that others were doing it as well, and the comments showed how much people appreciated it. Hopefully this is going to be a weekly online gathering.

You can find previous Isolation diaries here.

Over the last couple of days I have been receiving emails telling me that events I was planning to attend have been either cancelled or, optimistically, postponed. They offer me the choice of getting a refund for the tickets I bought, waiting to see whether the event will go ahead later, or leaving the ticket money as a donation. I have donated in every case, adding on the benefit of Giftaid.

I could afford to buy the tickets in the first place, and I am not experiencing a drop in income during this crisis, so my financial position has not changed at all as a result of the cancellations. So I don’t need the money, but in many cases the organisers and performers do.

Running local independent theatres and music venues is a risky enough business in good times, and I certainly want them to emerge from this dark tunnel with a future. So the Rose Theatre Kingston and the Riverside Studios in Hammersmith can keep the money I spent on tickets. As can the Mayor’s charity gig I was going to attend in a couple of weeks, and the 70th Anniversary Dinner for my choir.

Speaking of the choir, I was, in fact, due to sing in a concert myself this Saturday (Bach Magnificat, since you ask – see image). I do hope some of the people who had already bought tickets reciprocate and don’t ask for a refund. (For any other singers out there – take a look at the Sofa Singers.)