Notes From A Small Village
Jul. 19th, 2020 03:08 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
f4f3Apparently there's some sort of a lock down going on, but it's largely passed me by. At least until now, when I should be getting ready to take M to Austria for a birthday opera, and gearing up for the Edinburgh Festival. The lack of Festival isn't going to hit me the way it does the natives - it's been part of M's August for all of her adult life - but I will miss it. For me it's the late-night buzz around the Pleasance, and the hit and miss of seeing six shows in a day. Ah well, next year.
My company pivoted pretty quickly to home-working, as you'd hope it would, being a global IT firm with a good view of how things were playing out in Asia. One Monday in March we were asked to work from home on Friday, as a test, and we haven't been back since. The company are doing a phased return from August, but my team haven't been told to come back at all - I staged a raid on the office for my chair and two monitors, and I'm ensconced comfortably in our study. The only complaint I have is that it's a little dull in there, since there's thick brush outside the window. A wren was building a nest there earlier this summer, so it won't be getting cut back quite yet.
I'm fully aware of how lucky I am. No one in my close family has caught the virus, we have a detached cottage with room for all plus pets, and I've managed to keep working. So no complaints from me. The lack of sun is a bit of a bugger. I bought an extra week's holiday this year, which means I now have about six weeks to fit in between now and the end of the year. We have tickets to fly to Prague in September (a birthday gift to me) and I'm hopeful we'll be able to use them. I really wanted to do a drive to the South of France too, and maybe cross some more borders before they're closed to Brits, as we enjoy our freedom of movement, but it looks like that may be, literally, no-go. And that's something I won't be able to do next year.
But, on the whole, life is good. There's some pretty heavy duty pet-care going on just now, but again, that's inevitable when your spaniel is pushing 17.
Hey ho, and on with the motley...
My company pivoted pretty quickly to home-working, as you'd hope it would, being a global IT firm with a good view of how things were playing out in Asia. One Monday in March we were asked to work from home on Friday, as a test, and we haven't been back since. The company are doing a phased return from August, but my team haven't been told to come back at all - I staged a raid on the office for my chair and two monitors, and I'm ensconced comfortably in our study. The only complaint I have is that it's a little dull in there, since there's thick brush outside the window. A wren was building a nest there earlier this summer, so it won't be getting cut back quite yet.
I'm fully aware of how lucky I am. No one in my close family has caught the virus, we have a detached cottage with room for all plus pets, and I've managed to keep working. So no complaints from me. The lack of sun is a bit of a bugger. I bought an extra week's holiday this year, which means I now have about six weeks to fit in between now and the end of the year. We have tickets to fly to Prague in September (a birthday gift to me) and I'm hopeful we'll be able to use them. I really wanted to do a drive to the South of France too, and maybe cross some more borders before they're closed to Brits, as we enjoy our freedom of movement, but it looks like that may be, literally, no-go. And that's something I won't be able to do next year.
But, on the whole, life is good. There's some pretty heavy duty pet-care going on just now, but again, that's inevitable when your spaniel is pushing 17.
Hey ho, and on with the motley...
no subject
Date: 2020-07-20 06:10 am (UTC)This sounds good but is very factual. What has the year been like psychologically for you? It's hard to see how the statements '[lockdown has] largely passed me by' and 'in March we were asked to work from home on Friday, as a test, and we haven't been back since' can be completely reconciled.
no subject
Date: 2020-07-21 11:45 am (UTC)But the work at home measure isn't really a big change for me, more formalising the way that I've been working for the last couple of years. The programme I was running last year was wildly distributed, geographically. My direct reports where based in London, Finland, Germany, Spain and the US, and I reported in to Japan, mostly. The one place I didn't have team mates was Edinburgh, and going into the office was voluntary. This moved on even more in December, when that programme completed and I took on my new roll.
So yes - being out of the office completely has been a change, but not a huge one.
no subject
Date: 2020-07-21 01:18 pm (UTC)Fair enough, and probably the standard way. I'm just better at the psychological than the factual, is all.
It does sound like you are unusual in quite how little this genuinely has affected you, though. I'm glad you're alright.
no subject
Date: 2020-07-21 02:07 pm (UTC)Apart from a job that's actually easier to do remotely, I have a family who've stayed in good health, somewhere to live that has a lot of outdoor space (and basically is surrounded by fields) and supermarkets within a 5 minute drive.
The stuff that impacts me seems so trivial by comparison that it feels churlish to complain: I'm missing the sun, and wish I could go on holiday safely. I miss coffee meetings with my friends (more than I miss coffee - did I mention I gave it up before Christmas?) and I miss seeing my family, but we were already pretty wide-spread, geographically.
I think I should be touching wood, because I DO know that I've been lucky so far, and that this is far from over.
no subject
Date: 2020-07-21 02:45 pm (UTC)I feel similarly. My family have been okay so far (though I do have a close friend still in a coma, which is awful). I don't have school age children. I have a big enough house to have my own study, and a reasonable IT setup. I don't live with anyone violent (or incredibly annoying, as someone I'm close to does). I have a (tiny) garden and can easily walk to green space. My individual client work translates well to remote media. I'm not financially at risk right now. This puts me in a better position than nearly everyone in the country.
On the other hand: I miss a wider range of human contact (and didn't realise how much until I was able to start having some again). I can't go swimming. I haven't seen my father (who has dementia) for four and a half months and miss him dreadfully (and, worse, he misses me and is desperately upset by it and can't understand it). I am perpetually exhausted and can't quite work out why (and yes, I know that's not a new phenomenon, but am still confused by it, inter alia given the lack of commute). I find it exponentially harder to stay psychologically engaged with work.
One thing I notice (and see in many of my clients) is that people who know they are relatively lucky can find it hard to talk about the real challenges that they still have. You're not someone I'd have ideally put in lockdown because you're so extraverted and connective, so I'm really glad to hear that you've brought such resilience to it. But it is still a tough time.
no subject
Date: 2020-07-22 12:01 pm (UTC)He was always unfailingly polite to me, as well as a witty and fascinating person to talk with. I hope he gets as much comfort as possible when dealing with this terrible disease. I also know how much he means to you, and I hope you get to spend time with him soon.
no subject
Date: 2020-07-22 12:06 pm (UTC)He really, really liked you. That's not his usual setting.
no subject
Date: 2020-07-23 02:27 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-07-22 12:08 pm (UTC)I count myself lucky, though, Michael, and I mustn't leave you thinking otherwise. This is awful, and particularly (as you say) considering who he was. But we can afford to get at least some help, which most people in the social care system can't; I can't begin to imagine what that must be like. My mother, who turned 82 on Monday, has the appearance and stamina of a woman in her late sixties. And we are close. I talk to both of them every day, and although talking to him is harrowing, it is also filled with love. My mother, Char and I message nearly every day. I would not trade this for a family that has fewer challenges but is less deeply attached, and I know you'd feel the same.
no subject
Date: 2020-07-23 02:27 pm (UTC)My Gran stayed on her own into her late 80s, and only moved into sheltered accommodation when her dementia started to be dangerous (she started leaving the cooker on, mostly). I remember having perfectly lucid conversations with her about visits from old friends - who had been dead 40 years - but she still did her own shopping and, as my mum pointed out, walked in and out of town up steep hills.
My mum visited her daily, once she'd moved into sheltered care, and she was mostly happy until she passed away, at 95.
Why am I telling you this? There were some bad times with the dementia (times when she begged us to let her die) but those passed, and she forgot them almost instantly. What mattered to her was that we spent time with her, even if she thought I was my dad, or my sister was our mum. I hope you have many happy time ahead with J.
no subject
Date: 2020-07-24 06:53 am (UTC)This is really beautiful. It sounds like your family handled it amazingly. It can be so tough.
Jeremy has aphasia. It is the most awful thing. His thinking is often perfectly lucid, but the words that come out of his mouth aren't the ones he intends, so the people around him can't understand them. His sentences are grammatically correct, but Chomskyan: "I have too many copies of my foot." So spending time with us is often painful for him, because he can't make himself understood, and for us as we strive to interpret what he meant.
There is so much love, though. I can't begin to tell you. At times I find myself thinking, "This is what it would be like to have a child." I mean, I love Weezie (my niece) to distraction, but not with quite the same tenderness and intensity.
TL; DR: it's a beautiful experience and I would not trade it, even though it's heartbreaking. I miss him, though.