A few of us, a handful maybe, feel as if we’re benefitting from lockdown. Our work was changing anyway and we’re used to living hand-to-mouth. So we don’t feel it yet, the pain, though we see it all around us.
However, it’s another sunny day and we’re not booked to fly anywhere so let’s walk in the park before preparing a healthy brunch at home. Yes, how come we’re getting fitter when there are people getting their faces smashed open by rubber bullets on the streets of America as they peacefully take a stand for justice? Is this the privilege they speak of?
We, the handful, are experiencing a golden time. And, to be fair, we didn’t realise how exhausting all those international trips were. But how could we complain about grabbing another sashimi box at Terminal 5 on the way to the gate where we could order a coffee with a double shot before watching all the movies we’d missed at the cinema? “Can I get you another gin and tonic. Any ice for you?”
Yes, those impossible deadlines. The consumer society had us on our knees too, albeit on the softest velvet cushion you could ever imagine.
Over the next few months we WILL feel the pain. Some of our favourite shops, restaurants and cafes will never open again and a friend will tell us about someone who’s died. That’s it.
Oh, and the world economy will collapse but at least LEON will stay open, and they have good wifi there.
We, the handful, have two hands. One to help ourselves and one to help others. For much of our lives we’ve been the sound of one hand clapping. Very Zen of us, and it felt… ‘right’. But this new decade, the twenties, calls for the sound of two hands clapping.
We’ve heard it on our doorsteps for the NHS and key workers. Maybe we could clap, collectively, for something else today. Something bigger.
It could turn into a riotous round of applause that even our government couldn’t ignore. I’m not talking physically, I’m talking mentally and spiritually. What shall we clap for now?