A routine is essential to my way of thinking in these dark days of a melancholy May, a mere scattering of social events and a considerably altered work pattern.  In my case this concept adds dismal significance in that I haven’t seen my wife since before Christmas last year. But as a wise person from the emerald island stressed for me: although we are physically apart we are both united in that affection which joins us and which is eased by the considerably advanced nature of today’s electronic communication and, most essentially, we are snug and safe in our respective places..

When we married all we had was a fixed phone line to keep up with our family and work business and a radio to keep up with the world’s. Before email there were things called letters which one wrote using a pen, a sheet of paper, an envelope, a stamp and a visit to the nearest pillar-box. Amazingly, in this respect, I have rediscovered among my things a suitcase filled with carefully filed letters by year dating back over forty of them. No junk mail here: everything has been kept for a reason (I’ve already looked at a couple of these years but somehow one needs truly emotional strength in many cases and I would like to have Sandra un-virtually by my side to go through this personal archive for her reactions would be quite invaluable. I just wonder if we could say the same thing about our emails. Would they ever be filed and treasured by us in quite the same way? )

What then is my routine in these days leading to a Mediterranean summer (we hope)?

I wake up at around seven o’clock although it can be earlier. I then remember to take my first lot of dammed cardiac pills (further lots will follow at midday and in the evening – fortunately they are now down to six samples). I visit the bathroom, put on the coffee on my upstairs little electric stove and have two small cups of Lavazza coffee with a digestive biscuit.

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I then settle down (in bed) to do my language Duolingo lesson. Every day is a different language day. French is Sunday, German is Monday, Hindi is Tuesday, Latin is Wednesday, Thursday is Russian and Friday and Saturday are Welsh. Only one of these languages is new to me. French, in which I remain reasonably fluent, dates back to my school days. German is a massive revision of a language never learnt in an institution with the sentence word order still driving me bananas at times. Hindi, I once could speak quite well during my youthful time in North India (I have visited the southern part of subcontinent twice since but have not touched Malayalam or Tamil tongues – they don’t speak Hindi there).  Latin is pure revision again dating back to school days. Russian is the only new language on the list and the main reason why I’m learning it is to get used to yet another alphabet in addition to Hindi’s Devnagari script. It’s weird learning a Slavic language for the first time, however, but I find the word order easier than that infernal German.

Lastly comes one of my really favourite languages, Welsh. My knowledge of this lovely Celtic language dates back to 1990 when I used to attend London’s City Lit and was taught by a marvellous teacher. My knowledge of Welsh was enhanced by courses at the centre for endangered languages by that stupendous bay at Nant Gwrtheyrn and the central outpost of the University of Wales at Gregynog. Every language has its particular challenges and Welsh’s are its mutations which add to the musicality of this language – almost on a par with my Italian which I don’t need to brush up that much at all. Indeed, I’ve mentioned before the extraordinary number of Welsh words bearing a remarkable similarity to Italian.  For example, going from Welsh to Italian: Ffwrn=forno=oven, ysgrifennu=scrivere=to write (in Welsh ‘u’ is pronounced like ‘ee’ in English) and so forth.

If I don’t do my languages the day feels incomplete (quite apart from losing my Duolingo streak which now exceeds four hundred continuous days). Learning languages is also a kind of mental work-out and I’ve been told that learning at least one new language has become an increasingly popular activity in these covidian days and prevents premature senile dementia.

Then it’s skyping Sandra and reading to her a chapter from one of the books we are understanding together. There is no particular logic to the books chosen except that they are all extremely legible. ‘Little Women’ Part One was quite enchanting and this has been followed by Herman Hesse’s miraculous tale of self-discovery, ‘Siddhartha’ which we finished today. It’ll be back to ‘Little Women Part Two’ tomorrow because neither of us can wait much longer to see what happens to the March family (no spoilers please!).

Again, these are books I have read before, often years ago, but a good book is always worth re-reading since one views it differently as one differently views the landscape from a lighthouse’s spiral staircase. Indeed, life IS a spiral staircase. We are progressing upwards, travelling over the same places, experiencing parallel events but always from a novel perspective. Life is just as Govinda said to his friend Siddartha:

“We have learned much and much remains to be learned. We’re not going in circles; we are going upwards. The circle is a spiral, and we have already climbed several steps.”

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(Inside the lighthouse at Mahabalipuram Tamilnadu, India which we visited in February 2017.)

Will we ever reach Nirvana when we get to the top or is that just another illusion?

Then it’s downstairs to sort out our cats’ breakfast. Four cats (in order of seniority, youngest first, (Archie (2019), Cheeky (2013), Carlotta (2012), and Cornelia (2005)) plus an unofficial tailless black cat appropriately called Nerina who dates back to at least 2009, are to be fed in the morning and then again in the evening. There is also Cornelia’s litter tray to be cleaned – a concession she is allowed to have because of her old age.

The morning’s main routine of tasks begin: gardening, house cleaning (yet another rota), repairs, errands, shopping etc. since I have now left the world of work, at least work for money. After lunch I always try to fit in a walk in the lovely countryside surrounding our humble Apennine abode. As the ferryman in ‘Siddhartha’ muses:

“I’m going into the forest; I’m entering the unity,”

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I do believe that, in these somewhat disjointed times, finding ourselves a routine is essential. I hope I am not being too obsessive about emphasising it. It seems to work for me anyway…at least I still remember which day of the week it is!

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