Eerie

As we are permitted to leave isolation for health purposes or exercise, I thought it was justifiable to walk across Cambridge to retrieve my old bike, marooned in the office bike store for over a year. Our access cards are being deactivated so time was running low. Without any of my tools, my friend Hannah sent me the genius reminder that there’s a fixed pump stationed at the office for bike-related emergencies. I was surprised but pleased that despite the layer of cobwebs the bike has survived various seasons and it was only the tyres needing air. It was fantastic to be on a bike again, and I’m glad I now have it for daily exercise as it’ll be nice to cycle along the river and move more than 100 metres from the place I’m staying, which confines me to one room with a shop only two minutes’ walk away. Madness is already setting in.

Moving around Cambridge is eerie. I think it’s largely to do with the lack of traffic. There has been an explosion in people maintaining sanity by running, with their panting the most audible thing whilst traversing the common.

I completely felt like I was walking around in some eerie netherworld. With confinement we will become more attuned to our surroundings but the digital world is what we’ll have to inhabit. Our appreciation for the natural world will grow but our separation from it will increase. We will treasure connections with people but also be more fearful of them. We hope the country, and world, will come together but we’ve also seen repeated examples of crisis and shortage during which fears and hostilities are exploited and worsened. Overall I am not in a place of hopefulness.

At least this boathouse looked serene, shimmering into the river.