Serpies survive Covid-19 blog

Early Days: before the lockdown I write about my world:  it wasn’t an easy start to the year.  There was so much to say and I have had to cut it down. Some people will know that my daughter has terminal cancer, which was first diagnosed about 6 years ago. On 27 February I attended the cremation of the partner of one of my oldest friends – she died of ovarian cancer just as the virus was emerging. I was aware of the virus in China, etc.  My life however was mainly enjoyable with friends etc, my good solid relationship with Alison and the fact that I think I am fairly grounded and stable in life. My first real awareness of the world changing was on 2 March, when we met friends for a walk along the canal from Hackney to Kings Cross and I remember our joking about touching elbows.  We stopped for coffee in Broadway Market and I noticed how crowded it was. I was relieved we were a group of 4 and so had an area to ourselves – whereas Al...

*** It's Mental Health Awareness Week ***  Now more than ever, we need to look after not only our mental health, but that of others too W ell, this is taking a while, isn't it?  I don’t know how many of us expected lockdown to last this long. When my colleagues and I left the office in March, the scientific part of my brain didn’t expect to be back in there until at least June. But a softer side of my brain wanted to cling to the reassuring idea of ‘just be a few weeks.’ I’ve been working from home for two months now. For much of that time, working from home has meant working from hometown. I’ve still got my ‘grown-up job,’ but I’m sleeping in the bed I slept in as a teenager. So far, it’s been good – apart from when I had to suspend a new office buddy for misconduct. I could tolerate Jake jumping on the keyboard when all it meant was that his totally adorable face overshadowed any of my contributions in video meetings. But I had to take action, unfortun...

THE LUCKIEST SERPIE IN LOCKDOWN   Last week as I sat down to write this piece my phone rang. It was Nick, a winemaker by trade and one of my oldest friends. We have been close since the early 1990’s when he gambled his career on joining my incipient wine business. Its subsequent success was in no small part down to him.   An Australian, Nick is usually upbeat and bouncy. Not this time. I immediately heard the wobble in his voice. My instinctive “How are you mate?” was met with “Well, not so good Jerry”. Nick was calling to tell me that Andy B had died the day before. Andy had been one of our sales team. Now in his mid-50’s, he was a jovial, kind, smiling, enjoy life kind of guy. No athlete, but far from a couch potato. I immediately thought Covid. But no. Andy died of a heart attack while cycling in the traffic free lanes around the village where he lived in Yorkshire. He loved cycling. I was well into my fifties before anyone I was close to died, other than very el...

*** The Serpie Mental Health blog needs  YOU ***  If you would like to write a post, please email  wellbeing@serpentine.org.uk Added salt to a lockdown injury? When this whole lockdown started, the last reason that I thought I wouldn’t be running was because of injury – but here we are, three weeks later, having covered a total of approximately 6km. Before you all start worrying (I know you were all concerned, bless you), it’s nothing too serious. The culmination of a seemingly ridiculous amount of mud on Hampstead Heath that anyone who ran one of the two cross countries would still be having nightmares about and the unseasonably baking hot weather the other week that I definitely made the most of on my building’s roof, led to a very uneven running surface and ultimately my downfall (quite literally). One mis-step whilst not concentrating caused my left foot to give way and I rolled my ankle, ending up in an ungainly heap on the floor. It also left the su...