Life under Lockdown

I won't go into the awful aspects of the pandemic -  the hospital patients struggling for breath; the deaths, without family or friend by the bedside; the job losses.
​I want to dwell on the positives — air pollution reduced; cleaner air to breathe; fish and marine mammals returning to cleaner waters; the quiet - broken only by birdsong; neighbours and strangers helping each other; families and friends staying in touch; volunteers filling gaps in health and community services; governments housing the homeless.  And, as David Hockney titled the iPad painting he sent out to the world from his lockdown in Normandy,  'Do remember they can't cancel the Spring'.
It's a beautiful season in Ireland, and so far, this Spring is no exception. Blossom and budburst everywhere. Lines from Gerard Manley Hopkins come into my mind:
"Nothing is so beautiful as spring—
  When weeds, in wheels, shoot long and lovely and lush;
  Thrush’s eggs look little low heavens, and thrush
Through the echoing timber does so rinse and wring
The ear, it strikes like lightnings to hear him sing;"
David Hockney also said, “The only real things in life are food and love in that order.” Well, I suppose we need food to live to love. 
Food has certainly been the biggest feature of lockdown for me and my husband so far. One of us shops when absolutely necessary.  We now keep an inventory of the food in the fridge, freezer and cupboard. This morning, I planned all our meals for the week ahead— not least because we must use every frozen item before a much-needed de-frosting of the freezer. 
I am slowly bringing more order into our home life, tidying cupboards, sorting through boxes of photographs, making a daily list of 'things to do'. I miss golf, and bridge, and swimming in the outdoor pool at the leisure centre, and walks by the sea and convivial dinners and wine-tastings with friends and relations. But the social restriction has prompted me to telephone friends who live futher away and to whom I haven't spoken for ages, having deflected to the speedy, but lazy, simplicity of email. I sometimes video-call, but the etiquette demands pre-warning the recipient of the call, so the surprise is diluted. I prefer the intimacy of the voice in the ear. 
So many artists, professional and amateur, generously post things on social media for our delight and entertainment. The pianist, Angela Hewitt (I'm a fan) posts a piano piece every day on Twitter and Facebook. The American poet, Billy Collins, reads his poems live on Facebook. When I think about how life might return to normal, his poem, 'As Usual' comes to my mind. 
"After we have parted, the boats
will continue to leave the harbor at dawn.
The salmon will struggle up to the pools,
one month following the other on the wall. 

The magnolia will flower,
And the bee, the noble bee —
I saw one earlier on my walk —
will shoulder his way into the bud."

It's not all bad.