These are surreal times. Living through the era of ever spreading Coronavirus, it feels as though we’re living in a sci-fi film or novel. Life is as never before in our lifetime. In fact even those much older than us haven’t experienced anything like it. As one old man commented – ‘We knew who we were fighting in the war. This is an enemy we can’t see.’
This isn’t a sci-fi novel that we can read quickly to get to the end, or a film that we can fast forward to see who/what survives. If we try to predict how long it will be before life returns to normal, if we try to estimate how many more months it will take – that can be totally depressing. All we can do is take life day by day and enjoy what we can do – for now anyway.
At least the natural world continues to be predictable. The flowers brighten the gardens, woodland and hedgerows; the birds continue to live their lives as normal – no self isolation for them and the leaves on the trees are beginning to show signs of opening.
In Beckett’s ‘A Piece of Monologue’ he refers more than once to The sun long sunk behind the larches. New needles turning green. Beckett was born at Easter – a time when the new needles on the larches would be turning green – just as they were in Knockman Wood when I was there recently. Thankfully, the natural world helps to keep us sane.
Life's a Beach 