Whisper it, but I’m quite enjoying this sweet isolation

My sister and i Facetimed for the first time ever yesterday. We’ve had the technology to do so for years. We speak to each other at least three times a week but, until now, we have never felt the need to gaze upon each other as we did so.

Why bother? i know what she looks like. i could predict to within a neatly knotted John Lewis scarf exactly what she will be wearing, how her hair will look, that she will be sporting nicely polished brown boots.

i know every inch of her kitchen, right down to her teapot collection on the shelves to the right of the sink, some of them gifted by me, her wise, generous and ever-so-kindly big sister.

so no Facetime needs for us. the mental picture is there, already ingrained. Previously, i needed only sound, not sis-o-vision.

Now, however, the restrictions of ongoing selfisolation mean that i want both. i crave both!

so we clocked in on Facetime, her lovely, cheerful face suddenly taking up the screen on my phone, my own image a postage stamp in the corner. ‘stop looking at yourself,’ she said. ‘i’m not,’ i lied. ‘How is your moustache?’ she wondered. ‘in abeyance,’ i lied. ‘Not sure about your new haircut, do you like it?’ ‘yes,’ i lied. ‘Are you still in your pyjamas?’ she said. ‘No,’ i lied. so that went well. No one is saying that these new ways of siege communication don’t have their drawbacks, but apparently we must all embrace them, no matter how perilous.

A message pinged onto my phone at about 10pm the other night. ‘Do you want to Houseparty me?’ asked a friend. Of course i bloody didn’t. even though i didn’t know exactly what it was, it sounded ominous — and i was right.

the makers say that the Houseparty app allows you to ‘video chat with groups of pals, play games together and more’. i’m rather worried about that ‘more’ — but if even the Duchess of Cornwall is signed up, it must be above board.

However, sometimes it’s best not to pry, isn’t it? especially when it comes to the private behaviours of close friends and royals.

Over the past two weeks, Houseparty has been downloaded more than two million times, while a similar social-distancing app called Kast allows groups to organise virtual drinks parties and dinners in ‘your very own virtual living room’.

thanks, but i’ll be washing my imaginary hair in the virtual bathroom next door, if you don’t mind.

But i want to be honest here. While i miss my sister, close friends and family, for those of us with a slightly reclusive nature, self-isolation is not without its charms.

the forced cancellation of all social engagements and every single visage-a-visage in the diary for weeks ahead has its undeniable, spirit-lifting upside.

yet now we have to contend with our phones suddenly becoming weapons of mass communication: a merciless lighthouse beam swinging into your home when you least expect it, a documentary camera poking its nose straight into the cloistered balm of your own precious domesticity.

My fear now is pressing the wrong button on the phone and everyone clocking me in all my egg-stained jumper glory, hair in a bun and watching old clips from the vicar of Dibley* (see above).

But there is no escape. even at work. this newspaper is now being produced remotely, with everyone except key technical staff working from home.

each day we communicate and virtually meet with each other via a conferencing tool called Zoom, which reveals rather interesting glimpses into my colleagues’ home lives and yes, psyches.

there is usually someone, perhaps a more technically deficient workmate, transmitting thickly forested close-ups of their nostrils as they bellow ‘CAN YOU ALL HEAR Me?’ down the line.

Me? i’ve gone for the ‘what, this old thing?’ approach, nonchalantly appearing on Zoom in a take-me seriously blazer, full make-up complete with all-over primer and eyebrow mascara, in front of a shelf groaning with every award and trophy i have ever won in my entire life.

‘What’s that one on the left?’ someone Zoom-asked yesterday.

‘it’s my Brownie Pathfinder Badge,’ i said, looking at my fingernails and trying not to burst with pride. Boom, Zoom room! the ensuing silence was obvious testament to everyone’s new-found appreciation of my bottomless skills.

Finding a path, indeed. What could be more appropriate in these challenging times as we fumble forward into the darkness? the fact that we are all forging on, being apart together but together apart, bears great testament to the human spirit, to collective responsibility, to resourcefulness and acumen, but most of all to me and my gold cup for Best Knitted egg Cosy. CAN YOU ALL HEAR Me?