Category: June

Went for a walk yesterday and to my annoyance a group of children and mothers had spread themselves at the bottom of the Thames foreshore steps meaning it was impossible to pass without getting within 2 meters. But I felt they were being thoughtless so I decided to press on and go around them very close to the wall but I didn’t want to go back through the group a second time. So I decided to walk over to the other staircase on the side of the Prospect of Whitby but it was intensely muddy with that concrete-like muck that sometimes collects on the shore so I had a rough go of it.

Adi and Emma’s thank you card with a link to their wedding photos arrived. Bittersweet: so lovely to see everyone together, gathered in such happiness. At the same time, wondering when we’ll be able to have such a gathering again. The future looks so…sparse and distant. For everyone who wants to get married, waiting for a visa or a citizenship ceremony, memorial services…All the fun of ordinary life is gone but so are the special things, the occasions we look forward to. I realized if I move to Edinburgh now I wouldn’t have a support network in place. Moving between peaks would be good but if I got ill up there I’d only have Lexie and that’s a lot to ask. Here I have the Kellens and Cora nearby and other friends a little further off. Much as I hate the thought of paying through the nose for a smaller, darker and less beautiful/spaciously viewed place to live, I have to bite the bullet in the short term, I think, to feel like I have people to turn to. So the best option might be another flat in Newlands Quay except I have to mentally tack on another £200 for the service fee to the rent each month. The price of rent hasn’t really gone down much. A little but I expected a bigger drop. But if I stay to the end of the year we’ll be Brexiting while I’m in London instead of a firmly established Scottish resident. What’s more important, immediate sense of security and community, or longer term bets (and safety net with more savings)? The future is always uncertain but it feels like the world is crossing a rubicon right now. I know that (for now at least) my position is secure and my personal suffering will be minimal. But I feel so many things: guilt, anger, despair at times, hope at times. Occasionally joy. But I’m so tired. I mean soul-tired. Can’t focus. My soul yearns for a role that lets me fight for more justice. But my pragmatic mind tells me to “put on my own airbag first” (i.e. secure my own material situation and meet my financial obligations) first before accepting lower pay and more precarious work. That helps no one. But I feel like a participant and perpetrator of an unjust system when I put my material comfort first. I am not ready to renounce all material comfort and live in a religious community (and which would I choose anyway?) But also the sacrifices of the gods of commerce are great indeed. Let’s see…in fact I have no choice…let’s see where the future takes us.

Unsatisfying call with Irene yesterday, who’s decided she’s just done with social distancing & because the London case numbers are dropping the risk must be over. I tried to explain why I’m so afraid for America & her reaction was “but people always call him a fascist” which is true because we always knew where this was going, but now it’s actually happening. She’s just too jaded to it all to really empathize right now. But other people are there with me donating and so on. I can see that people are unlikely to continue virtual socializing once they can be together physically, with the possible exception of my Swiss crowd. This makes a difference for my “move out of London” plans. Because I’d have to get a whole new community, exactly when I’m trying to avoid people. Daphne keeps suggesting a giant house in the country but what I really want is a more hacienda-style dwelling where we all have our own side of the house but there’s a central courtyard for parties and general hanging out. Several small cottages in the same place would do. But as things are I have to be content with friends scattered around a big city: I feel hemmed in and lonely at the same time. Urban alienation wasn’t really a big part of my life before but it’s noticeable now.