I’ve taken over the gardening since the virus reached our shores.

There were monsters everywhere, mostly in the shape of many robust Phormiums and boney Cotoneasters. Using my shears and hairdressing skills, I took them all to task. And now they’re clipped, trimmed, and far less scary.

This activity had two positive effects: it kept me fit and, boy, does the garden look better.

It was therapeutic mentally, too.

The virus, that’s chosen our species as its favourite snack, has got in amongst us on more than one level. It insidious unknown nature has attacked us where it hurts the most: our gregarious, bonding needs. Even socially dysfunctional introverts like myself are affected by the curtailing of meeting up with and hugging loved ones.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m all in favour of staying safe and well by masking up and keeping our distance from each other while the virus continues to run rampant around our country. My point is, we have to acknowledge the extra damage – in some cases long-term physical damage – this virus has done to our mental well-being. Being hyper-vigilant day after day, week after week, month after month is exhausting.

Getting the garden under control was a useful way to externalise my fear and, yes, fury against the devastating effects that this monstrous virus has wrought around this planet.

Stay safe and well, dear friends.

When I was a child, I wanted to learn how to sign, like Deaf people. I didn’t know any Deaf people, so I don’t know why I wished that. Later, I joined the Girl Guides. To earn a badge, I learnt the signed alphabet. Many years went by. In the mid-1980s, I was given the opportunity (another story) to start learning British Sign Language. As part of the learning process, I regularly attended the local Deaf Club where I made a group of friends. My signing improved, and I started taking BSL exams.

I live on the south coast of England, my daughter lives in highlands of Scotland. In 1988, my first grandchild was born – with multiple special needs, including the inability to speak. When she was around five years old, she began to learn a simple sign language called Makaton so she could communicate her life needs. My grand daughter came for her first visit around that time, with her mum. As well as other special needs, she has a form of autism, and being in a strange house with everyone milling around began to distress her. I took her out into our garden.

We walked carefully and silently up the garden until we came to the pond. We sat down and watched the fish. She gave a deep sigh and began to relax. She looked at me. I said, “fish”. This was clearly not a word on her life needs list. Then I signed ‘fish’, pointed to the fish, and signed ‘fish’ again. She signed ‘fish’ and smiled. I signed it back to her. Then a neighbour’s cat joined us. Actually, it was there to hook a fish out of the pond, if it got the chance, but with me there it settled down to wash itself as if that were its purpose for being there all along.

Birds like our garden for its insects. My grand daughter added two more signs to her vocabulary. Turns out she adores cats. “Cat, bird, fish!” became our greeting to each other after that.

By the end of the 1990s, my grand daughter had created her own form of modified Makaton, and I had become a CSW – communication support working with Deaf students in schools and colleges, Deaf professionals in the workplace, and as a tutor to special needs students with hearing, like my grand daughter, but no speech.

Life has taught me many things. One of the most important lessons I’ve learnt is that language is so much more than words, and words are so much more than language.

“Cat, bird, fish!” to you all. Stay safe and well.

This is how I feel: I feel like I’m the fucked up one. I feel like I’ve gone cuckoo bananapants, because I look out into the world and I see people who think the pandemic isn’t real; I see them not wearing masks anymore; I see people who somehow think Trump is doing a good…

You’re Not The Fucked Up One — Chuck Wendig: Terribleminds

Today at 12.30h. Conflict: external and internal.

Grocery delivery van arrives in our narrow, single lane road.

Delivery Man offloads weekly victuals and leaves them in designated socially distant area.

Door of cabin swung shut and locks delivery man out. *Engine still running.

DM cannot find his keys. Distressed, apologetic, needs to call depot.

I mask up and wash my hands; he masks up. I give him our landline phone. He ‘phones home’. E.T. comes to mind.

“They will be here soon.”

It’s mid-day. The weather is meltingly hot. I give him a huge umbrella and a bottle of water. We can’t invite him in: we’re in the ‘vulnerable and shielding’ bracket.

DM sits on the ground up the road in the shade of a neighbour’s fence. I feel a pang of guilt.

The large van is obstructing traffic arriving and leaving.

I send an apologetic email to all the neighbours.

Two hours creep by.

I give him another bottle of water all the while secretly worrying that he will want to pee. I make preparations for that eventuality. Hand sanitiser by the front door. Check. All doors to the nearest loo wedged open. The loo is given its second thorough sanitising of the day. Fresh towel. Check. Anti-bacterial soap dispenser. Check.

I continue to feel guilty that a delivery of food to the house has caused this mayhem, and the poor man is in all that heat. Best Beloved rolls his eyes. “Not everything bad that happens in the world is your fault.” Not the first time he’s said this over the 50 years we’ve been together.

DM finds the keys in one of his pockets (they’re like bags sewn on the outside seams of his trousers). He’s excited! So am I.

He puts the key in the lock and tries to turn it. It doesn’t work. He goes to the passenger door and tries again. Nope.

The cavalry arrives in the shape of a short stocky chap in a high vis tabard, with keys and a number that has to be entered into a gizmo that he’s brought with him.

The cabin door opens!

DM returns the umbrella with thanks, scrambles into the open cabin before it slams shut again, and drives the van away to the nearest gas station, across the valley.

“I might cry.” 

Another eyes rolling response.

“Go and put your blower thing on and cool down.” Best Beloved says. Then he makes me a mug of tea.

I’m in the lounge, sitting at my computer, enjoying the breeze from the fan, with tea a few inches from my hand. 

All’s right with the world.

*One thing continues to puzzle us: how was the engine running, if DM had the keys in his pocket?