Einstein's theory of special relativity says that time slows down or speeds up depending on how fast you move relative to something else. During the last lockdown time seemed to move on almost imperceptibly, indicated by leaves budding and blossom falling, birds building and the sun warming. With no stated finishing time and little idea of what was going to happen afterwards, time edged along rather lackadaisically relative to no fixed point. And so did we. We luxuriated in the torpor, made no plans and lay
in our garden loungers stirring ourselves only for a gin and tonic or to watch the shadow slide round on the sun dial. Now nature seems less munificent in tracking time for us, the signs are less obvious. The sun is a little lower and the leaves have fallen, but the only changes will be their slow damp rotting on the path, otherwise every day will look the same. So even though they might make a lovely golden carpet I’ll sweep them up and compost them ready for the Spring.
This time Time is very different. Time is speeding up, relative to a declared date of December 2nd and we seem to be being rushed, like the treadmill at the gym suddenly flipping into fast mode and our feet flying from under us. We barely had Hallowe’en or November 5th to prepare for and so instead, since early October, we’ve been swept along towards Christmas on a flood of Amazon Black Fridays, speculation, wistful thinking and provisional plans.
It used to be Masson Mills Shopping Centre in Matlock Bath that would have Santa climbing up the wall from September. But Masson Mills has closed down and instead we’re all climbing up the wall, planning lights, nativities, carol services and the rest with all the back-up plans, fall-backs and frantic Whatsapping, Zooming and emailing. Floundering around in the unknowns – who will we be able to meet with, what shopping can we do, how many of us can get together and the one thing we can rely on – Boris will get it all wrong. There was a rumour a while back that a locked-down Christmas would be simple and stress-free, with no alternative but to pop a ready-cooked meal in the micro-wave, hunker down, turn on the TV and raise a sherry glass to the Queen.
Anyway we’ve been practicing stress today, trying to fit a new router and get our WiFi to work properly. It’s been a Bacchanalian frenzy of plugging and unplugging, cursing, screaming, forgetting passwords, passwords failing, head-banging and telephoning the provider – a nice young man called Andre who seemed surprised to hear from me several times in one afternoon.
I think I’ll retire to a cave and rely on smoke signals or semaphore for communication.