Monday, April 13, 2020

Updating my CV - Week 3

So, week three of the lock-down and we begin to see things as they really are. Most people are nice. Some are not. Some are hypocrites and, as Marina Hyde so wisely put it in The Guardian, all of this is the fault of elite footballers. A thousand people a day dying is not because of government incompetence but because Raheem Sterling earns too much. You knew that.

The key thing to remember through all this is that it is not wrong to be a hyprocrite. It is wrong to get caught. Nobody apologises for telling us not to visit our second homes in any circumstances and then visiting their own second home. No-one apologises for visiting their mother on Mothering Sunday even if they've just told the whole country not to do that and then done it themselves. And no-one phones the BBC and says 'I had a couple of sex workers round last night please forgive me' during a lock down. They apologise after they have been outed. The hypocrisy is not being sorry until you're caught.

Since my own loved ones and I are not currently ill my main sacrifice is to stay at home in a nice house. I'm reading more. I'm playing my piano more. I'm curating, rather than leading, worship. It is the week I left the Tim Vine Joke Appreciation Group on Facebook because so few of the members had the first clue how a Tim Vine joke works. Or they posted unoriginal ones without credit.

A few years ago I had a column in a church newspaper. It was meant to be vaguely amusing and the Editor praised my light touch until he sacked me and gave the gig to Catherine Fox. Whilst I was writing it someone I worked with came up to me and told me the 'joke' about Bill Stickers being prosecuted. He genuinely thought I should write about it. It helped me realise how the humourless worked. Many of them are Tim Vine fans. They think it's easy. (Once saw Milton Jones demolish a heckler with 'It's not as easy as it looks is it?') The same sort of people write 'poems' for family funerals. Ones that don't rhyme, scan or use English as I understand it. Reading them out appropriately is one of the hardest things I ever have to do. I only ever got the giggles once at a funeral, when I pushed the button to cremate Grace Burns, but eulogistic poetry has led to some close calls.

Life. Not as easy as it looks. Death also.

The while this week, TCMT is volunteering at the food-bank. You guessed it. There was a store-room in town that needed procedures and merchandising and she won't rest until the whole world is done. Really. If you ever shop with her you may experience her tidying up someone's else till area whilst waiting to be served. If you do it with confidence nobody questions you. It does get her out of the house three mornings a week which just about provides me with sanity space, and there is a fringe benefit. Things are dropped in to the food-bank that have use-by dates or are not wanted. We have picked up two huge tins of choppd toms (2.5k each) and a decent supply of duck eggs.  I know. Nailsea eh?

Yesterday morning's exercise walk took longer than usual because of the number of distance-respecting pastoral conversations we got involved in. During the week I use headphones, get up a bit of pace and keep my head down. If I was allowed two walks a day I'd do a pastoral one and a hamstring-stretching one. Just before lock-down I was on a therapy programme at the gym for a tweaked hammy. Never done one before so I have no experience at recuperation. After a week's holiday with plenty of walking I went back to the gym and set the treadmill to my usual warm-up jog. In my week away the machine had been recalibrated to MPH not KPH and I started off far too fast. Twang.

So it's gentle ambling with an occasional jog again. But no stopping. Back at home the landing has become the place for exercise. TCMT does her yoga and pilates classes online there and I'm joining up with some online gym stuff this week too.

What did you do during the war Dad?

I stretched on the landing son; government orders.

I've been compiling a list of people who are having a good lock-down. The two members of the family involved in music production and distribution are working hard from home, sales up. I have to wait ten days for my new jigsaw orders (there's no end to my personal hardship) - sales are up. And my friend who has a medical supplies business, despite being generous to all, has seen 20% year-on-year growth. It's pretty clear that the technology businesses behind Zoom!, Houseparty and the like are doing OK. Why did my fellow Area Deans and I ever drive 45 minutes each way to meet at Saltford? In fact why did face-to-face meetings ever happen? Sometimes you need to see someone's expression clearly when you ask them a question, I guess. Sometimes.

Today is Easter Bank Holiday Monday. Normally the post-Easter day for going wibble. Ain't no wibbling happening here though. Just gentle waiting.

Hope you're all well.








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