Sinead O’Connor sang ‘it’s been seven hours and fifteen days, since you took your love away’. Well, for me it’s been 13hrs and 85 days, (or 12 weeks, or 3 months) since I took myself away; away from the world beyond my garden gate, to live in isolation as one of the two million people or so, who have been advised to shield themselves owing to the current pandemic.
To misquote Charles Dickens, "It has been the best of times, it has been the worst of times; it has been the age of wisdom, it has been the age of foolishness. It has been the epoch of belief, it has been the epoch of incredulity, it has been the season of Light, it has been the season of Darkness”
It has, above all else, been an interesting experience, and not one I would have imagined myself undertaking a few months ago. I could never have imagined not wearing shoes, using a purse, or driving a car for 3 months. These things I do not mind in the least, although I am not looking forward to the inevitable blisters that will erupt on my protesting feet when they are eventually forced to accept the confines of footwear.
But, these things also remind me of just how much I am removed from society, from the shared experience of ‘lockdown’ and social distancing experienced by those not shielding. There’s ‘distance’ and then there’s remoteness. I have no idea what it is like to visit a supermarket during lockdown; I don’t know the customs for distancing when you come cross someone on a walk, or what the hedgerows look like.. Apart from the evidence on my flat screen, I have no idea whether the world outside my garden gate even still exists. My Facebook page is full of beautiful photos friends have taken on their daily walks, so I assume some kind of life continues in the big wide world during my absence. But, images of my daily walk would be nowhere near as interesting: bedroom, bathroom, kitchen, lounge, dining room, garden; repeat, repeat, repeat.
I have not been in the same room as another human being for 12 weeks and resorted to hijacking the neighbour’s cat for 20 minutes yesterday, just to have some physical contact with another living, breathing creature. The contact was great, although his thoughts on existential anxiety were somewhat limited.
I say this, not to invoke sympathy, but to explore why the actual experience of isolation is so far removed from my expectations of it.
When all this began, I was very blasé about it. I am not, habitually, a very social person, and consequently thought it would all be a bit of a breeze. It would give me an opportunity to lounge around in my pyjamas for 3 months, eating chocolate, and to do all those really important things I have successfully put off for years. I fondly imagined cataloguing my books according to the Dewy decimal system, writing an epic novel, and finally learning to crochet. I stocked up on books to read, books to listen to, and any number of craft activities.
I was all set for a giant holiday and the opportunity to rediscover myself, and my hidden creative talents in the process.
Well, I have rediscovered myself, but not quite in the way I imagined it would be.
There have been some really positive outcomes. I can now tell the difference between a dunnock and a sparrow, recognise an orange tip butterfly at 50 paces, and have finally got round to reading ‘Three men in a Boat, (to say nothing of the dog)’ by Jerome K Jerome. I have also discovered that I enjoy making things out of felt; spoiler alert – everyone can expect hand crafted lavender bags for Christmas this year!
I have learned that there are 270 different species of bee in the UK and have taken to chasing them round the garden, trying to identify them. What difference this will make to the bees is unclear, but I have learned a lot
about their habits and become even more enamoured of them in the process.
So, there has been much that I have taken delight in, but there are things I have struggled with, some of which really surprised me.
I have tried the ‘isolation’ experiment before. A few years ago, I decided to see what it would be like to remove myself from the world for two weeks. I took a fortnight’s annual leave, stocked up on food, switched off the phone and didn’t speak to anyone, or go anywhere for the duration. It was wonderful, and I re-emerged rested, restored and re-energised. How much better then, to have a whole 3 months to do the same thing? A kind of sabbatical for the soul.
I have to say, it hasn’t been quite like that. At the outset, the government and media were focussed on the need for social distancing. At the time, and following one of our long philosophical discussions, Anna and I thought that maybe, a better term would be physical distancing as, with the plethora of social media etc available, we could all still be social; it would just be from a physical distance.
And I have taken full advantage of it, with regular Zoom / Skype meetings with friends and family, which have been great. But … I have learned it is not the same as actually being in a room with another human being. Instead, I have discovered that fundamentally, it doesn’t matter how technologically sophisticated we become; emotional connectivity, face to face, remains a core part of being human. We need each other on some kind of physical, 3 dimensional level as well as the flat, 2 dimensional images projected through a screen. Well, I do anyway, and I can’t be alone in that surely?
The Care Act’s wellbeing principles include the following:
Physical and mental health and emotional wellbeing
The individual’s contribution to society
Domestic, family and personal relationships
It could be argued that all three of these are part of what it means to ‘belong’ to society on either a macro or micro level. And I wonder what, for those isolated within their own homes, this belonging looks like. How does one ‘belong’ in society when you can’t physically be a part of it?
Imagine you wake up tomorrow morning and discover you have no job, you live alone and you can’t leave your house. Now imagine that you also rely on others to support your personal care, do your shopping and cook your food. Imagine this happening, not just for a few days or weeks, but month after month after month. Imagine being seen solely a recipient of society’s beneficence, not viewed as a contributor to it; being ‘vulnerable’ rather than independent and empowered.
I can’t begin to imagine half of this. I still have a job and am independent with regards to my personal care needs etc.. The only thing I don’t have to imagine anymore is living alone, being confined to my house and not having any human company. And that, without having any additional needs, has been challenging enough.
I really hope I don’t forget the reality of this experience when I finally get ‘released from captivity’ (Boris Johnson, May 2020). There is so much talk of ‘getting back to normal’, but in our haste to do so, let us not forget, or exclude from society, those for whom what I am currently experiencing is the norm.