Years ago, I used to run around Hyde Park every Monday. The same route each week. Different experience every time. The light, the weather, the people changed from one Monday to the next. Prince Albert disappeared under scaffolding for a few months. And emerged new and shiny-looking.
When we went into lockdown, my regular running route to Gunnersbury Park felt dramatically different. Ordinary sounds, smells and sights faded. Like the rumble of traffic on the Uxbridge Road. The spice aroma of the Indian restaurants I passed. The people coming out of the shopping centre with their large brown Primark bags. These things had been so much a part of my life that I’d never really noticed them before. I missed them. Because they are the sounds, smells and sights of a city in action.
It’s May 2020. I’m out for a lockdown run. The roses are blooming like never before. I had no idea there were so many. Bushes and bushes of them. Giving off a perfume so strong, it reaches me as I run through the streets. There are some in my garden. One after another, people out on their daily walk stop to thrust their noses into my roses. To smell one of the smells of a world in lockdown.
I turn into Gunnersbury Park. Where the café was recently set on fire. Anger-fuelled arson. The anger of people feeling trapped. Unable to do their thing. So they pour their fury into other things. Vitriolic posts about Dominic Cummings. BLM protests. Statue toppling. Burning down Gunnersbury Park café, which is a symbol of all that they can’t do. Leaving a lingering smell of smoke. Which becomes, for me, one of the smells of lockdown.
My run takes me through the deserted shopping arcade. The coffee shops are shuttered. There’s no clatter of mugs and plates. Not a croissant in sight. The baristas are furloughed. Or out of a job. The coffee machine is silent. It’s the silence of a world in lockdown.
I head over to Ealing Common. It’s crowded with people. People who have trodden new tracks in the grass. Covid tracks - two metres from the tarmac path. People are cycling. People are walking. It’s easier to run on the road on the eastern edge of The Common where cars are usually bumper-to-bumper. It isn’t that way today. The North Circular is in lockdown.
But May and June have passed and now lockdown is easing. The sights, sounds and smells of my run are becoming more as they used to be.
I warm-up on the balcony. Recently the garden has been overrun with screeching parakeets. Today, I see one glorious bird soaring across the sky. The 5.20 arrival from Bangkok is on its descent into Heathrow. We’ve all been grounded. Not just the planes. This is the sight of the world awakening from its pandemic sleep. And going places again.
I enter the park. It’s almost deserted. A few serious runners. A smattering of dog walkers. People have other places to go now. Friends to visit. Seaside trips to make. They don’t need to get up early to go out on a boring old socially-distanced walk anymore. They can stop trying to love running. Give up on the couch to 5k. An empty park. A park that’s coming out of lockdown.
I exit through the gates, carefully avoiding a woman who looks like she's still carefully avoiding people. An unusual sight now. Most have stopped bothering. I run up the mini-hill where the road crosses the railway. An old van passes by. A familiar smell assails my nostrils. It's something I haven’t smelt in a while. Petrol fumes. The smell of the world getting back on the road. It’s a smell I like.
I pass Café Zee. Hear the voices of people ordering americanos and cappuccinos. The roar of an espresso machine. The beep of cashless payments. It’s the sound of the world having fun. It’s a sound I love.
On Sunday, we’ve got a table booked at the North Star. We will hear, see and smell the sounds, sights and odours of the pub opening up. The slosh of large Malbecs being poured into our large glasses. The sight of people gathering, reuniting with long-lost friends. The smell of stale beer that wasn’t quite washed away from the night before. It will be the sound, sight and smell of the world getting going again. A world that is ready for action. How I love that world.