Lockdown Diary - Saturday 8th May 2021

Shopping in the rain with son #2 as son #1 didn't make it home from the Isle of Wight/New Forest last night.

Usual Saturday morning of chores and so on.  

Election results incredibly depressing with the odd pleasant surprise. Everything is aligned.

Attempting to move things forward but it is a struggle as all my efforts seem to be rewarded with absolutely nothing.  A friend recently told me that her approach to life was, 'expect nothing, and you won't be disappointed'. Half true, at the very least.

I think it would be easier to be positive and keep on pushing to change things if I didn't have to always return to, or be surrounded by, such a difficult and negative situation. I always return to this and it's hard to remain upbeat and positive in this environment. Not to mention any other shit, by luck or judgement.

I have my usual long chat with my mother-in-law in the afternoon. She is well but still hasn't had he first vaccine and I have to nag her into calling her GP surgery as it's way overdue. As is becoming common-place she starts talking about her daughter's health both in the context of her son and also what has happened to her. Hoping for miracles or just seeking an end to it all, one way or another? Depends whose shoes.

My brother-in-law called a bit later, which is quite unusual: my father-in-law is unwell and in hospital with an infection. Apparently he's been delirious and has been trying to escape, having been 're-captured' descending the fire escape.  For the first time in god-knows-how-many-years I spoke to my brother-in-law's wife (what is she to me? I haven't a fucking clue? Sister-in-law? Doesn't sound right), or rather I think she grabbed the phone. It was OK, she was fine, though frankly however it went I'd have dealt with it.  My father-in-law has daily carers (though they don't seem to have been doing a very good job as he was dehydrated when he went in and they omitted to call the emergency doctor but instead left an  answerphone message saying the emergency doctor needed to be called) but my brother-in-law + 1 has been helping out with shopping, company etc. He said one of the benefits of his dad being in hospital was that it gave them some respite from helping out. As I was listening to this and politely agreeing with him, I couldn't help but have a wry smile as I thought: 'tell me about it, try seven plus years, 24 hours a fucking day, mate'  I am sorry to hear about my father-in-law, though not entirely surprised, given his age and, more significantly, losing his wife a month or two ago.  

A rose by any other name. A year or more. En route. Clock-ticking down, but let's just wait and see.

Managed to listen to some new music (The Anchoress' album for the second time, some of the recent Nick Cave solo album ('Idiot Prayer') and some of Celeste's debut) before helping son #3 with dinner.

Film night. Son #2's turn. He chooses a science fiction action film, 'Ghost In the Shell', which stars Scarlett Johanssen, so whatever the film is like it will be good on the eyes.

In the event the film isn't bad (or as my sons would say, 'it was decent', though, given the star, indecent would have worked for me). I even remembered to delay taking my anti-depressant (that's a thought, should I be taking more?) so I can actually stay awake for the duration of the film, unlike last Saturday night.  The visuals in the film are good though the setting in a world of cybernetically enhanced humans is pretty depressing, a future I don't think I'd want to be a part of. There are worse ways to spend two hours, God knows, but it's not one of the great films you should see at least once.

After that sleep, too tired to read, apart from this week's poem ('My Last Duchess' by Robert Browning, which, though it contains some wonderful lines and language, doesn't really do it for me)

Suede / 'The Invisibles' / 'The Blue Hour' 

['The Blue Hour' is a bloody great album, I must listen to it again sometime soon]

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