EDITOR’S LETTER
STAY TRUE TO YOUR GOALS IN EVER-CHANGING TIMES
This is not normal. Apparently, it’s the “new normal” – or so everyone in power is hell-bent on telling us. But let’s be clear: the new normal is not natural, nor regular, nor routine, nor habitual, nor any other synonym you might care to consider. This is not normal.
This morning, I woke up at 4am, tossed and turned for half an hour, then gave up. I went out for a run at around 5.15am and started work at 6.30am. At my desk, I could hear my wife snoring. I have managed to cut well over three hours of commuting from my working day and yet I feel busier and more squeezed than ever. This is not normal.
By 10am, I couldn’t think straight, so I made myself an espresso before realising that my 13-year-old son hadn’t woken up yet. English was meant to start at 9am. Having listened to him grunt his way through some Harper Lee and set out some trigonometry for his next lesson, I joined a Zoom meeting with my colleagues. Halfway through, around noon, I realised that I hadn’t showered.
This is not normal.
The pandemic seems to intensify everything. I have always been the sort to adopt a debit-and-credit approach to health. I do something virtuous and I reward myself; I do something bad and I atone. This see-saw now vacillates throughout my daily life. At 2pm, I walked the dog, stopping at around four or five intervals to do sets of 20 squats and press-ups. Back home, I made myself a mackerel and sweet potato salad before getting back to work with a green tea. At 3.30pm, I had a pork pie and a packet of Frazzles. At 4pm, I stole my daughter’s Crunchie from the fridge and mapped out the next day’s 10K while eating it. This is not normal.
At 7pm, I had a go at one of the Men’s Health Instagram Live workouts until I could physically do no more. I then proceeded to drink more cider and red wine than I am prepared to admit here. Finally, I staggered to bed and attempted to pick up on the same page my book had been left opened at a fortnight ago. But the words didn’t go in. My mind was too full. It wanted to escape but found itself rooted to the spot. I decided to write my editor’s letter. This is not normal.
You are holding the second consecutive magazine that we have started and finished in lockdown – our team working entirely remotely, our production lines connected by email and Zoom. All of us have our own skewed version of normality right now, which may or may not include a dependence on processed snacks and Pinot Noir. But I am lucky. I have my health, my family and a job I can continue to perform from the safety of my home.
I am keenly aware that perhaps this is no longer normal, either.
There’s much within this issue that deals with the state we’re in. “Life After Lockdown” (page 88) looks at the implications of the pandemic on the ways we can hope to train, work and socialise in the near and distant futures. I am especially proud of a photo story we commissioned – “Industrial Revolution” (p122) – that documents the way in which UK manufacturing rose to the challenge of supplying much-needed PPE to the NHS.
But elsewhere, it’s business as usual – providing you with the tools to deal with life head-on and be the fittest, strongest and happiest version of yourselves, the present circumstances notwithstanding. Because we aren’t here to tell you that it’s normal – new or otherwise. We’re here to tell you it’s OK.