The End of The World

It's the end of all things I do think it's true, if I had to blame anyone I'd only choose you. Your selfish and evil it has to be said, you should think of everyone but it's all self in your head.

Is it the end of the world?

Feels like an alarming question to ask really doesn’t it? Bit on the hysterical side of things.

It’s frankly however a question that people could have been forgiven for asking a lot in recent years. 

In these strange and dark days of burning tower blocks full of trapped residents, of exploding people at Ariana Grande concerts, of reality TV stars being elected to the highest political office, of segregation of families and friends across Britain all over a vote on the issue of ‘sovereignty’ within a finite world full of finite people living on finite land masses. The end of the world is an often used phrase and it’s often used to downplay a situation. ‘It’s not the end of the world…’

When one speaks of the end of the word however, it conjures up apocalyptic images of fire and brimstone, of large crowds running from erupting danger and damnation in the streets.

Lets put the ostentatious cliché’s to one side for a moment however and instead let us examine the reality, not just of our present situation, but also of the very phrase ‘The end of the world.’

After all; everything ends doesn’t it? Our childhood ends, our adolescence ends, journeys end,  do pandemics and their associated lockdowns ever end though? You’d be forgiven for beginning to wonder. While we are wondering about that; lockdown pushes on and while it does so, many things end around it.

My social life has ended. My ability to go on holiday has ended. My interaction with human beings outside of family (within my household and support bubble only of course) and work colleagues has ended. My enjoyment of life is threatening to end, no sod that it HAS ended. It hung on in here but I am NOT having a good time right now….

You might say to me if you’re optimistic that these things haven’t ended at all you see, they’ve just been suspended, all in the name of that well worn phrase ‘the greater good.’  

I was buying into that when all of this began nearly twelve months ago.  I ‘clapped for Key Workers.’ I showed solidarity and felt that war time public brotherhood, that spirit of the blitz. This is Britain! We’re strong, we can get through anything. Who do you think you are kidding Mister COVID? I  was compliant, I was on board,  I felt that I saw a light at the end of this bleak and ominous tunnel. 

Then I started hearing worrying phrases in the media such as ‘new normal.’ I visited my beloved London and was witness to what that beautiful city looked like with its heart and soul ripped out, while small business owners struggled to make ends meet in a noxious atmosphere of oppression.  

All of these things I describe, each of them form cornerstones of my world and bit by bit they’ve been taken away. They have ended. Without them, my world can’t breath, without them my world doesn’t turn, move or live.  You might say that to me personally THIS IS the end of the world, or it certainly feels like it and they do say that perception is reality. If I perceive it I live it. Or in this case living it seems an inappropriate expression as all we’re existing within now is an absence of life.

This lockdown in which we find ourselves, this yawning chasm of isolation in which so many have found themselves lost, shall not only feel like the end of the world to some people, but it WILL have been very much the end of the world for them.  Sparing a thought for a moment, for those individuals who will have already been in an isolated state before all of this began. People who may have never received any human contact at all save for that they encountered at the local library, the local café or shops. That’s been taken away from them now and for many of them it will have been a lifeline make no mistake.

Thing about lifelines, when you start taking them away from people, bad things start to happen. They’re called lifelines for a reason. People find it very difficult to continue on with their lives without them. People who have had those lifelines snatched away from them and simply can’t live without them and won’t be able to. They’ll stop. The ‘cure’ for these people is worse than the disease. Worse for these people; lockdown is a disease and it leaves people decimated.

I don’t know about you, but while I can count my blessings and admit that I am not on the harsher end of this scale and not feeling its ill effects quite as damningly as the more socially destitute will the fact is; I am struggling.

There was hope in the summer time wasn’t there? Remember that? The fourth of July came along, it was Independence Day in America, I rechristened it ‘IndePUBdance Day’ here in the UK as I re-joined the alcohol soaked brethren in the local public house. It wasn’t life as we knew it of course, there were plastic barriers at the bar, there was distance given and household segregation on separate tables and so on. People were sensible. We were willing to take steps to help out while still HAVING OUR FREEDOM. Cooperating to make a difference by choice, willingly, not via draconian coercion. 

It’s not as if and nobody is suggesting it, that the pubs opened and me and mine began a twenty four hour booze fest!  We simply went to the pub a bit. We got to see other people (at a safe distance of course) and have a chat. Got to do a bit of people watching; one of my favorite pastimes. Got to take the temperature of the masses (literally and figuratively) and see what the man and woman on the street thought of all this.

It actually felt at that point, last summer, that the road back to freedom was a reality. That we’d endured the darkest days and we were finally approaching the dawn of a bright new day. There was tangible hope.

Then, gradually at first, things began to happen. It began to feel and I’m speaking from my own perspective here, as if a giant net had been cast over us all and gradually it was being tightened and tightened and tightened, all the while our wider surroundings began to diminish around us. Our outlets began to become diluted at first then withheld then eventually removed.

We began to hear tales of Liverpool. We heard of the lawless citizens apparently dancing in the street, mixing in what the news seemed to suggest was an almost constant fashion. For me, the manner in which these reports were made seemed to conjure images in my mind of huge conga lines progressing through Mathew St in and out of The Cavern Club. Participants jigging boozily all with cocktails in hand as they kicked their legs out joyously, nary a facemask in sight.  Indeed I’m forced to imagine what these vile transgressions looked like because I only ever heard about them I never saw them. It was a narrative.

Other things began to happen; we began to hear about ‘tiers.’ Varying degrees in danger apparently existing throughout the country, as if Coronavirus itself were a sentient malignant entity stalking our streets actively looking for people to infect. We were in tiers then and I’m in tears now of a different kind! Not alone in that respect at least. 

We were not permitted to mix with anyone outside of our tier or to ‘cross tiers.’ It all sounds so very strange. I put it to you that if people are deemer safe as long as they’re a certain distance away from one another then what difference do tiers actually make? Moreover, if the issue is people in built up areas such as Liverpool mixing with one another when they all live there anyway, what difference do these tiers actually make to anything? Also; why is it perfectly fine for certain establishment figures (I’m looking at Dominic Cummings) to flagrantly and completely unapologetically breach these tiers as if they apply only to us the great unwashed….. The plebs.

Masks were next! Halloween had come early my friends as soon we were being demanded to wear masks or ‘face coverings’ as they came to be known which is such an odd phrase…. Suddenly, even if you were at a ‘safe distance’ from others, you couldn’t enter your local supermarket, green grocers, pub or post office without making sure to have mask on your face. The face covering coming to be seen as some sort of badge of honor you should be demonized for lacking. 

I have no problem with this rule in principle although I do again fail to grasp its logic. If we’re being asked to keep well away from each other in any case, what difference does a mask make? Does it actually help? Does it actually stop transmission of anything? Everyone is wearing them now, have been for months. Everywhere! So if they actually prevent anything, why do cases keep rising? Why is transmission (apparently) not under control? It feels like a psychological measure taken to me, it feels like another way of attempting to convey to people on a visual level just how awful things are. It feels like a narrative device.

This ever lengthening list of inconveniences felt bothersome, but we didn’t see fit to kick up a stink, just as long as we could still have our freedoms alongside them. We were happy to play ball in whatever unorthodox fashion, just as long as we could keep the ball! Just don’t take our ball away from us please! We’d wear face masks, we’d check-in, we’d happily keep a distance from people outside of our orbit; I mean I’ve been doing that all my life anyway, it’s not a big ask!

Only it wasn’t enough, nothing was enough as we were told again and again that we just weren’t doing all that we could be doing. Or rather we were doing the wrong things, you take your pick! 

So along came ‘curfews.’ My god, curfews in a democracy....

It seemed that the ‘experts’ had decided that the Coronavirus didn’t really get going until 10 PM and we were going to be in much more danger at anytime after that point. We were informed that the reason for this is that the more people drink, the less responsible they become and the less likely they are to follow the ‘guidelines.’ 

On the face of things, the logic of the pub curfews could almost be seen to make sense, until you analyze it a little bit closer. You see, when the pubs first opened back in July, they were quiet, they were almost empty in fact! They were safe places posing no risks to anyone. Then lookout! Here comes the curfew!

People feel rushed all of a sudden, they only have a few hours from work ending to the pub closing. So what happens? People begin to compress their drinking time (especially on a Friday and a Saturday) and the pubs go from being empty to being full. Result? The public are irresponsible and stupid for gathering together in pubs and drinking even though the hair brained rules put in place by the government have forced them to do so. Again I see it for what it is; it’s a narrative.

So came to pass ‘The rule of six’ another frankly terrifying and Orwellian sounding phrase. Never did I believe that I would reside in a world wherein on my way to work I would walk past giant LED boards telling me ‘STAY SAFE, STAY APART’ as well as ‘REMEMBER THE RULE OF SIX.’ They might just as well go the whole hog and have these boards read ‘BIG BROTHER IS WATCHING YOU.’ It’s like living in some sort of warped dystopia.

The rule of six was introduced apparently to counteract the ‘problem’ I referred to earlier. You see, now that our pubs were closing earlier, us selfish social people were causing the disease to apparently spread like wildfire and much more quickly than before, because we were all going to the pub together and earlier. Even though we’d been basically strong armed into doing so, but ignore that. 

The rule of six! Because apparently not only does this virus increase significantly in deadliness after the hour of ten, it also becomes far more virulent if people gather in groups of more than five. Three of you? Fine. Four of you? Fine. Five of you? You carry on it’s all good. Six of you? Criminal! Saboteur! Evil killer of the vulnerable and weak, how dare you darken our door in numbers of more than five, have you no decency? A narrative and a pretty bloody stupid one if you ask me. All you need do is think it through a bit to see how utterly devoid of meaning or merit it is.

All of these madly brandished restrictions, because that’s what they are, lets call a spade a spade, I could just about live with up to a point. I believed that it was all leading to a finishing line and that the finishing line was very much in sight. I was wrong though wasn’t I?  

We began to be told that we couldn’t see family members if they weren’t in our ‘support bubble.’ Not a problem I thought, we have gardens, lets just go and sit a ‘safe distance’ away on deck chairs and we’ll even wear a mask if we need to. Before long we were told no, they specifically began to tell us not to see loved ones even in their gardens. They actually used those words. I know many people feel that efforts and measures are being taken to save lives, but frankly THAT one felt mean. It felt almost designed to crush the human spirit and strangle hope. It felt like part of a narrative.

Here’s another narrative, a prevailing one in the media throughout all of this; I’m selfish you know. Yes me and people like me, people who enjoy their freedoms and want them back, we’re ever so selfish, we place greater emphasis on our own enjoyment than we do on the wellbeing of our fellow man! We should hang our heads in shame should we not? 

Never you mind the fact that we haven’t seen people we love properly in months now, never mind that even when pubs did open we abided by every restriction put in place even as those restrictions were altered around us, seemingly in an effort to sabotage our compliance and make us appear part of the problem. 

The narrative is clear; we’re selfish and it’s thanks to us that this pandemic has gone on so long. Not the government’s mishandling of the issue, not lack of clarity on the guidelines, not a failure to institute a structured isolation program designed to shield the most vulnerable while those us healthy and able keep the economy ticking over, no!  It’s us, it’s our fault, we’ve done it! 

Turns out that perfectly healthy people going out and mixing with other perfectly healthy people, even if they wear masks and keep their distance, all while making sure to avoid vulnerable groups THAT IS WRONG!

Good grief, what a lot I have to answer for. What dangers and peril I have brought about by socializing and drinking and laughing. Look at what I’ve done to the world! How dare I enjoy myself, how dare I seek to gain fulfilment out of life by chatting to others; I mean it’s 2021 for goodness sake, what am I thinking?

There’s only one answer isn’t there? 

I must be mad. 

Author's Note

Thank you for reading thoughts are as always more than welcome.