Even the geese in Bacup are social distancing
First week
Whoa. What just happened to the world we all know? To be honest, that is how this week has made me feel.
I hit the wall on Saturday morning, for many years I have been using that expression – usually when writing about marathon runners or people who have been completing an endurance feat far beyond my own capabilities – but when it hit… for me it hit hard. Having parents so far away, and now way beyond my reach in our lockdown situation, I started to worry, especially when my soon to be 80 mum told me she had been shopping 7 miles away in the closest town to their village home in Scotland.
All I could think of was the potential danger of someone in that queue or in that supermarket being a carrier, being unknowingly infected and the ease with which this silent killer, this dark destroyer can take over another person’s life… and maybe end it. When I awoke on Saturday I was crying, it was the first time this nightmare has made me cry but thank heavens for good friends. I swapped messages with Melly, I FaceTimed Glynis and I plucked up the courage to go public on Facebook with an honest post about how I was feeling.
Use Facebook for good people. Thank you to every one of the 40 people who responded to my post. Your positivity lifted the black cloud. It was lunchtime! I got dressed, shook myself off, went out and litter picked in isolation, came back home and baked bourbon biscuits. I was delighted to hear from a Cub who called me with her mum, and my good friend Rachel up in Scotland FaceTimed me that evening. By the end of the day I felt a whole lot better and I had a plan for the next day.
I usually have a plan, I always have a plan, but when facing lockdown and all the regular things that keep us together, that carry us through disappear or get jumbled up, we forget to make a plan. Sunday – I made
a plan. The list included a bath, cuttings, ironing, cross stitching, birdwatching…. and I ended up painting another huge blue triangle; it was lovely to get back to creating my very individual living room.
So new week new challenges, Monday should have been my day to produce another paper in a day at Coal Clough Academy, but Covid 19 put paid to that, so I began writing the school’s submission for the national Shine School Media Awards. However it also ended up being almost like a normal day at the office – well my office. I had stories to write for Whitworth High, JJO and M3 Project, I discussed promotion for VIC with the Rossendale Free Press and I felt more like me again. What a relief.
In the evening I spoke to my parents, explaining that there were organisations in their area who could help them with shopping and that my mum didn’t need to join the queue and risk anything. My dad, who has dementia, told me how he was going back home… again. And, of course, I also painted a huge pink triangle on another wall
A few more stories to write on Tuesday and I had an item to post so I walked to Stacksteads for my daily 
exercise and took my litter picker, hoop and two bags. I responded to the call from the lady at the bottom of New Line who asked for a specific area to be cleaned and I would like to say thank you to all the people who said thank you while I cleaned from New Line junction up to Lane End Road, I was genuinely shocked when the elderly couple I was chatting to (who were on the opposite side of the road I may add) said it was 5pm! Time to head home… a final orange triangle to paint!
As many of you know I am a Cub leader and a huge part of my life it is too, as anyone who gets involved with Scouting can attest it takes over your life sometimes, but it gives back far more than you put in. We have set up a virtual hub so that the Cubs can keep on doing badges and activities, having fun and progressing and I have probably spent far much longer than I anticipated today on that site but the interaction helps me as much as I hope it helps the Cubs.
One week down… many more to go I reckon.
So far
- 1 melt down
- 1 pompom rainbow created
- 2 supermarket shopping trips
- 4 newspaper cuttings posted
- 7 different garden birds photographed
- 8 bags of rubbish removed from New Line and the Britannia Greenway
- 9 stories sent to the press
- 40 positive interactions with friends
- 100s of personal interactions and chats missed – but we will all make up for these once we beat the bug.
It is ok not to feel ok – just tell someone. Stay safe everyone and look after each other.
Writing… it’s what I do…