Tuesday, 17 March 2020

SPRING: Day 1: Lockdown in France

Lockdown dawned in the afternoon of Tuesday 17th March 2020 which I shall count as Day 1.

In the morning, I wondered if my gardener would come as the grass was wet!
It needed to be mowed. He came. We discussed tasks.
He helped carry three fallen fence panels. I supplied the claw hammer. He pulled them apart.  They are too far gone to be re-erected.  The 7-year old larch panels were never installed properly!
I organised, he dug, we buried domestic compost collected  which I'd  put in the black poubelle since October.  We raked it to pull back the soil to make it more level at each end.  I like to think 20C temperature will rot down the turned over, dug in weeds and grass.

I should have kept him longer than an hour and a quarter.
I don't think he can come every Tuesday!

As he departed I saw my Parisian neighbour staying at a distance across the road. Strange,  I thought! I knew we had to keep one metre distance but this has now been extended to up to 3 metres!  We chatted ... he explained he had left Paris before midday, as in a Parisian apartment with no school there is no garden for 2 teenage boys!  Work was cancelled too!  They could do more here!
At the same time I opened my post box,,, it contained an example of the ATTESTATION DÉPLACEMENT DÉROGATOIRE.

I must fill in the form for each departure from my property and land. I must indicate one of the five reasons to be out and about.  I have decided to stay put and be in self isolation!

The Light Dawns ... in earnest, I begin to be more and more on the internet to follow UK and French coronavirus 19  regulations and restrictions.

I am well used to social and information isolation over the last 15 years of Life in France.
This will be a similar but different challenge.
I feel equipped to cope.


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