The world was a different place four short months ago. Those months have been the longest ever due to 'lockdown'. I'm conscious that I'm beginning to forget what life was like at the time and want to make a few notes to help me remember.
March and April were a time of random anxieties about the future and worries about what might happen but they gradually faded as we got used to queueing outside shops to buy food and the world around us didn't crumble. Many people continued to go work and others were furloughed because they weren't needed at the time. Radio and TV shows kept things upbeat and positive (like the great 'Grayson's Art Club'), theatres were very good at offering refunds on tickets, often asking for donations to keep them going but a refund wasn't a problem, and we got used to the new language of zooming everywhere. My Zooms were for online drawing sessions. May crept into June and June into July as lockdown started to ease as the country passed the peak of cases.
I started looking back to the strange days of March and April as being not so bad, when the roads and streets were virtually empty and the world was quieter and cleaner. The government started announcing stupid rules like 'social bubbles' that were totally unenforceable and people just started ignoring them and doing as they wanted. Raves started happening on the local Commons and litter significantly increased. Things were getting back to 'normal' in a pandemic. Masks or 'face coverings' started to become a 'thing' and became mandatory on public transport. I bought colourful masks from OddBalls, the prostate cancer charity.
The National Gallery became the first gallery or museum to open on 6 July for members and 8 July for the public. A brave move that was very well done with staff and guards wearing visors and visitors asked to wear face masks and maintain distance as they looked at the works. I gave them a week to sort out any teething problems and went on 14 July to support the Gallery and see some Art. Trafalgar Square was empty but there was a big queue to get into the Gallery by timed-entry tickets. That was the first time I'd been more than a couple of miles from my front door since March.
Other things started to open like 'non-essential' shops and department stores, pubs and restaurants, workplaces that could operate safely and it became a lot easier to book food deliveries as more people started shopping for themselves. Hairdressers and barbers became a 'thing'. Was this all happening too quickly? Probably, but it was what people seemed to want.
I can get into the centre of London by overground train to avoid buses and tubes and that's what I've been doing. Visiting an art exhibition, St Paul's and Tate Britain, getting a lot of walking in as exercise to and from train stations. I wore a mask on the trains and in the places I visited and will continue to do so. London felt more alive and busier last week, not back to 'normal' by any means and the streets were still relatively quiet, but London is waking up again.
What will happen next? I don't know. Most people seem to assume there'll be another outbreak of the virus and more deaths at some point so there's still a need to be careful since the virus is still out there. We'll see...
March and April were a time of random anxieties about the future and worries about what might happen but they gradually faded as we got used to queueing outside shops to buy food and the world around us didn't crumble. Many people continued to go work and others were furloughed because they weren't needed at the time. Radio and TV shows kept things upbeat and positive (like the great 'Grayson's Art Club'), theatres were very good at offering refunds on tickets, often asking for donations to keep them going but a refund wasn't a problem, and we got used to the new language of zooming everywhere. My Zooms were for online drawing sessions. May crept into June and June into July as lockdown started to ease as the country passed the peak of cases.I started looking back to the strange days of March and April as being not so bad, when the roads and streets were virtually empty and the world was quieter and cleaner. The government started announcing stupid rules like 'social bubbles' that were totally unenforceable and people just started ignoring them and doing as they wanted. Raves started happening on the local Commons and litter significantly increased. Things were getting back to 'normal' in a pandemic. Masks or 'face coverings' started to become a 'thing' and became mandatory on public transport. I bought colourful masks from OddBalls, the prostate cancer charity.
The National Gallery became the first gallery or museum to open on 6 July for members and 8 July for the public. A brave move that was very well done with staff and guards wearing visors and visitors asked to wear face masks and maintain distance as they looked at the works. I gave them a week to sort out any teething problems and went on 14 July to support the Gallery and see some Art. Trafalgar Square was empty but there was a big queue to get into the Gallery by timed-entry tickets. That was the first time I'd been more than a couple of miles from my front door since March.
I can get into the centre of London by overground train to avoid buses and tubes and that's what I've been doing. Visiting an art exhibition, St Paul's and Tate Britain, getting a lot of walking in as exercise to and from train stations. I wore a mask on the trains and in the places I visited and will continue to do so. London felt more alive and busier last week, not back to 'normal' by any means and the streets were still relatively quiet, but London is waking up again.
What will happen next? I don't know. Most people seem to assume there'll be another outbreak of the virus and more deaths at some point so there's still a need to be careful since the virus is still out there. We'll see...
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