Back to normal?

Included in the news reporting of the chief medical officer’s press conference today were statistics from Apple, showing that traffic volumes are almost back to pre-lockdown levels, public transport is down by 60% and walking down by 40%. While the less crowded footpaths are very welcome to me, I find it quite depressing that traffic is back to normal and lockdown is really only fully over today! So much for changing how we do things and living differently: looks like things are going straight back to normal. And of course that’s good in lots of ways but maybe we are missing the chance to do things better?

My marathon training is officially starting this day week; in preparation I ran 2 miles on Friday and 6 miles on Saturday morning just to prove to myself that I actually could. I went down the canal for the first time since 14 March, when lockdown started, and even though it wasn’t a great morning, I really enjoyed it. It was kind of emotional actually after all that happened over the last few months; I stood beside the locks and thought of my Dad and the negative ions. And the most important thing was I could run 6 miles, and I’ll do it again next Saturday. And more.