Hard Times

It's not difficult even at a distance of halfway round the world to get a sense of just how unwelcome the latest lockdown in the UK will prove to be. And if a lockdown doesn't get close to one hundred percent support it's difficult to see it having the desired effect. I can understand why the schools are being kept open, but that exception alone puts the whole thing in doubt. It must be strange to find yourself in a situation when something close to a new way of going about things is demanded but there's nothing in the way of a commonality of desire to achieve what needs to be done.

The degree to which people in this Far Place buy-in to the various measures taken to control the pandemic is striking, but that's been hugely helped by the success (so far) of those measures and the underlying logic of the approach. I don't like having to wear a mask all the time but I absolutely don't mind having to do so because the purpose of doing so is entirely clear. I notice little in the way of Covid-fatigue on these shores, despite the extreme challenges some are facing, possibly because of a feeling that we're winning.

That sense of success may ultimately prove to have been illusory, of course, but just still being in the game at this stage is a boost. It feels good to be able to think that one's efforts, minor as they are, to do the right thing are helping get results.