Jonny McCambridge: The choices we make now will define us forever

As I arrived there were two men at the front gates. They were talking, inevitably, about coronavirus.

‘Have you ever heard so much nonsense in all of your life?’ one asked the other.

The second man was shaking his head.

‘I know, it will all be forgotten about in a few weeks.’

I was struck by the utter certainty in their tone. I quickly walked on.

The following day I went to a supermarket because I hoped to get some food for dinner. There was a crowd at the store and a staff member had been assigned to ensure that only a certain number could enter the shop and that the rest of us stood a designated distance apart. As I queued I picked up on the anger of some of those who were waiting in front of me. Two women were grumbling and I heard one bitterly tell the other that she wouldn’t be shopping in this store again.

At first both events left me a little depressed. Later, as I thought more about it, I tried to understand why such sentiments had been expressed. The jerk which has been applied to society in the past week is immense and it is sadly inescapable that some will try to pull in the opposite direction.

The truth is that none of us, except those of the most advanced age, have ever lived through adversity on this scale before. What we have seen is certain people living their lives based on experience and instinct rather than advice, doing what they have always done and using familiar methods of preservation. One of the fallibilities of the human temperament is when habit tries to trump the logic of science.

It is easy to think of civilisation as an organic thing, something as inevitable as the tides or the rising of the sun. Coronavirus, and the lockdown it has caused, has bluntly exposed how precarious it is and how quickly the artificial rules that bind us together can begin to unravel. Very little is as it was before.

We all understand best the scale of change caused by pandemic through our own experience. My main role in this newspaper is to fulfil the duty of news editor. The job entails deciding on what news is placed in the paper, judging what are the most important stories of the day for our readers.

Several weeks back coronavirus was one article at the back of the news section, something remote which was happening in China. As it subsequently spread across the world it was given more prominence. First a page, then two, then four, until eventually it had taken over the totality of news.

Before Covid-19, when I planned the paper, I would have aimed for some stories on politics, health, education, business, something with human interest. Now it is coronavirus politics, coronavirus health, coronavirus education, coronavirus business, coronavirus human interest. It blankets everything like the heaviest snowfall.

And then there is this column. When I started doing this a few months ago the brief was to offer something apart from news, to wander in a different direction. Now I’m writing about coronavirus, because....well because what else is there left to write about?

Another thing happened when I went to my son’s school last week. Just after the overheard conversation between the two men I approached the front doors. There, on the paved entrance area, was a kaleidoscope of colour. Because the children were not allowed to go into the building some parents had left chalk for them to scrawl messages to the teachers and each other. The bright display of graffiti covered a large area. I stopped to read some of the scribbles, kneeling down to decipher the juvenile lettering. They were expressions of hope, rather than fear. One message caused me to hover for several seconds.

It read: ‘I love you Edward. U R my best friend.’

I don’t know who wrote it and I don’t know who Edward is, but I was left with the familiar feeling that children can teach us as much as we can teach them.

Coronavirus has reached a deep nerve, exposing both what is worst and what is best about us.

On one hand there are those who have emptied the supermarket shelves, forcing others to go without, and those who have abused pharmacy and healthcare staff who are working in terrible circumstances to help us. There are those who have stockpiled medicines, when advised not to, and those who left their homes at the weekend and gathered in public places, when the clear warning was there that they were risking lives.

But there has also been an outpouring of kindness, neighbours looking out for the elderly, friends shopping for the vulnerable, businesses, organisations and countless individuals engaging in selfless acts of charity.

I have no idea what the future holds. Like the man who spoke with such certitude at the school gates said, life may return to normal quite quickly. But it is more likely that we will have a prolonged period of living under severe restriction.

For now though, the challenges loom large. Scientists will try to understand this invisible virus, healthcare workers will try to treat those who are affected and politicians will try to reduce the public risk.

But there are also challenges for the rest of us and profound choices to be made. Will we choose to live in fear and look after only ourselves, or will we choose to live in hope and look after each other? Someday it will be over and the community that we previously knew will have to be rebuilt. This will end, but it won’t be forgotten, we have all been touched too deeply for things to be the same after.

It is the choices we make now, when it matters most, which will define us for the rest of our lives.