Friday 08 January
I’ve really got that Friday feeling this evening. It’s been a really tough week and Boris Johnson’s announcement of national lockdown #3 feels so long ago.
Driving home, I called Dad. I try to check in with him daily whilst in the car. It’s a good use of the forty five minute drive and I have turned it in to a habit now. We go through a bit of a routine but it’s comfortable and reassuring for both of us.
“How was your day?”, “Have you been for your walk?”, “What are you having for your dinner?” Pretty mundane stuff but it connects us daily and this tried and trusted formula works. For us at least. Of course, tonight we talked briefly about Mum and the situation in the care home. And although we are both cut up with anxiety inside our own heads and hearts, we keep it together and speak rationally about the situation now. Not about what might be. “Fingers crossed, Dad, we will just have to what happens?”, I say.
We talked about the weather and how we looked forward to the spring. It was as much a state of mind, and possibly metaphorical, as it was literal. Dad talked of how he just wanted it to get a little warmer. “I just want it to get into double figures, ten or eleven degrees will do.” I agree with him and explain how we need to be patient and just get to March 1st. Everything will feel alot better then.
But in the here and now, we will enjoy the moments that are not Covid, not Brexit or Trump. I feel that it’s time to switch off from all of that for the weekend, it will still be there come Monday. So, this weekend we will walk, enjoy the daylight hours and time with eachother. And that all starts with a Friday night fire in the wood-burner and a glass of red.
The Bald Birder 