IS THERE LIFE BEYOND LOCKDOWN?

It’s no secret that lockdown has affected people in different ways. There are those who have despised every second.

Those who couldn’t wait to go shopping in crowded places like Bicester, get on a plane, see friends in large groups. Then, there are others who are just a different personality type. Those who enjoy meeting up with friends, but either singly or in small groups. They couldn’t imagine anything worse than visiting Bicester! It’s interesting that when lockdown and its ‘success’ is discussed, people mention Norway where the geography and weather make partial lockdown almost a way of life.

Norwegians themselves say, “What lockdown? This is normal.”
Now, look at the World Happiness Report and which countries top the list. Yes. Norway, Finland and Denmark. Maybe isolation is the key to happiness after all. But isolation does affect people in different ways. Writers like me are used to sitting for hours alone at a computer so it isn’t such a problem. And post-lockdown, there’ll undoubtedly be a flurry of new books on the market due to the enforced confinement. Frankly, I haven’t minded lockdown, having worked throughout from home, as I am fortunate enough to be in the sort of occupation that allows me to.

But others are not in that position, as any catering, hospitality or care workers could tell you. And I enjoyed the slower pace of life of lockdown. But there’s blatantly some who would like to go on forever, more for their own comfort than to stop the virus. But people need to get back to work while there is still some work to get back to. So go to restaurants- or take advantage of their takeaways– and other post-lockdown businesses here in Spain.

Their income depends on services to all of us- otherwise, they face the prospect of an extremely lean Summer. Showing the sort of maverick intuition that will probably soon land me a job with Dominic Cummings, I grasp this simple, inescapable fact: use them or lose them!

Nora Johnson’s psychological crime thrillers ‘No Safe Place’, ‘Betrayal’, ‘The Girl in the Woods’, ‘The Girl in the Red Dress’, ‘No Way Back’, ‘Landscape of Lies’, ‘Retribution’, ‘Soul Stealer’, ‘The De Clerambault Code’ (www.nora-johnson.net) available online as an e-book (€0.99;£0.99), i-book, paperback &audiobook.All profits to Costa del Sol Cudeca cancer charity