Words Matter - Jo Carroll

We live in apocalyptic times.

I've not read much dystopian fiction - The Day of the Triffids was enough for me - so I'd be interested to know if the current runaway virus and the panic it has engendered is accurately reflected in fiction.

For one thing that has struck me in recent days (distracted me, if I'm honest) is how words that have such momentous consequences for us all are thrown around now without a second thought. For instance:

Social distancing: this, we are told, means we have to stay about two metres away from anyone else. Unpicked, it means no hug for the friends you bump into in the street. No sharing a cake. No sharing books unless you both do the ritual handwashing thing first. But - does it mean we shouldn't hug our children? Can we cuddle up to our partners on the sofa? (In theory, I've heard - no. We must all sit in separate chairs; couples should sleep in separate beds. As if every house has enough chairs and a spare bed lying around. To say nothing of anything couples might like to do to while away an hour or two).

Self-isolation: this goes one step further. Not only must we stand well-beyond hand-shaking distance from everyone, we must shut the door on them too. Supplies must be left on the doorstep and we can only pick them up once the angel who has brought them steps well back. In a family, it means one person has a room and, if possible, bathroom, to themselves (the great and the good might have enough rooms to do that, but in most people's real world when one person sneezes the whole family catches a cold). For two weeks, with the help of the internet and a book or five, it's probably manageable. 

Lockdown: everyone is in isolation. We can only scurry out for milk if we have to. Every other hour of every day is spent in your own four walls. 

I understand the need for such measures. I'm not in the camp that insists this is an overblown drama and, though maybe a few people will pop their clogs, it's not worth this palaver. It will be months - and maybe longer - before we are out the other side of this, and our world may look very different by then.

No - what exercises me is how these words: isolation, lockdown, have been sewn into our everyday vocabulary in such a way that their full implications are sanitised. I, like thousands of others, live alone. I will not be in the same room as someone else for months. I can no longer go to my singing group; I can no longer help in the library; I can't go to a gig and sing till my throat hurts. Nobody will surprise me in the street with news. No grandchildren will hold my hand, nor climb on my lap for a story. Tough for me? yes; and for the families with small children who face the same four walls for days; for those with disabilities whose only social contact is a day care centre (now closed); for the homeless and the workless and the children in care.

We will do this, because it's essential for our safety and to do our bit for our beleaguered NHS. But we will not like it. Isolation - packaged as it now is in government directives - is not our natural way of being. 

And so, next time Boris and his henchmen remind us to shut ourselves away and repel all boarders, maybe we all need to remind ourselves what such isolation means. Lockdown is not how we should live; when this is all over I hope the word is confined to the pages of dystopian fiction,