Changing times, changing people

 

THE NEW NORMAL?  WHAT'S NORMAL?

We went on our staff xmas night out a couple of days ago.  By which I mean Barbara and I went for a meal at four in the afternoon.  A pub that couldn't serve alcohol (which is something I find no longer bothers me in the slightest), only one other couple in the place, at the other end of the room, but friendly (masked) staff, a cosy fire near by, and good food.  Our xmas meal was haddock and chips, followed by sticky toffee pudding.  Because this is 2020.

We enjoyed it.  The absence of other people in these times is a lot more relaxing than a room full of potential virus carriers, the lack of 'atmosphere' an attraction more than a turn off.  Stay Safe remains the overriding dictum.  Sometimes it's already hard to remember what it was like in the olden times, before face masks became the latest fashion must-have.  

We used to go out a lot.  Music and comedy gigs, plays, sports events.  Edinburgh's festival, from April to August, were what we did, part of who other people knew us to be.  Now we're a stay-at-home couple, sharing the sofa night after night, looking out on 'our' graveyard and staying well away from the world.  Of the few live events we've been to this year, all bar one were in the pre-lockdown days, and that one brought it's own weirdness.  

At the end of August Edinburgh Rugby were allowed, as a government endorsed experiment, to play a match in front of a socially distanced crowd, for which I was lucky enough to get a couple of tickets.  The careful measures in place came as no surprise, and a few hundred people in a 67,000 seater stadium didn't generate much noise, but it was interesting to see the thinking behind it all working out in practice.  Although that wasn't the weirdest part, not for me.  That came when we left and I realised we were going home in the dark.  I hadn't once gone home in the dark since mid March.

We know (or think we know?) that at some point in the future we'll all return to life that's a bit more like what we remember from pre-covid times.  Not exactly the same, because more home working and online shopping and entertainment are with us now and won't entirely be reversed.   And not forgetting, despite Doris trumpeting his fabled deal today, that brexshit is going to bring its own damage and shifts in our ways of life.  But there will be a time when going for a meal or a drink or to see various forms of live entertainment will return as part of our collective experiences.  That, personally, I can go back to watching musicians and comedians and actors and rugby players doing their thing for my amusement and diversion.  

But will I?  In 2019 I went to 112 live events.  In 2020 it's been just 14. Just as our society has been changed by the last nine months, so have I.  We already know that we don't, can't, fully understand the long term alterations in our lives as a community.  I don't think we know how it's changed as people either.  I certainly don't know what it's done to me.  Will I go back to being that person that goes to all those shows and games?  Will I ever again rush around in August doing 40+ Fringe shows?   

2020 has been a year where we've been forced to learn a lot about ourselves.  I don't think 2021 is going to be any different.