My diary reminds me of how little I did last year, maybe Boris should get one

IBring Your Own Bluster/blag/betrayal, delete as applicable

n a new move for me, as we slide inexorably into what might still be classed as a new year, I have decided to draw the line at throwing things out.

And the main thing I intend not to throw out is not clothing, ill-fitting shoes, chipped tableware, terrible Christmas gifts, unnecessary paperwork, stuff I put in the cellar on the out-of-sight, out-of-mind principle or even, heaven forfend, things that might have come in handy sometime but somehow never did.

(You know, by the way, that you have finally turned into your mother when you start to look philosophically at the now empty receptacles which once contained festive goodies and find yourself thinking: “That’s a nice tin. I’ll keep that and find something to put in it.” Recycling has a lot to answer for…) Nope. Decorative tins aside, for the foreseeable future ie the next year, I am going to hang on (like grim death, aptly) to last year’s diary.

Clinging to the past, real or imagined, has, after all, become a British national obsession in recent times and never say I don’t do my bit for this great nation of ours.

Usually, as the first days of each fresh annual turnaround turn themselves around, I carefully transfer birthdays, other significant dates and events (or in the case of 2020-21, non-events) into a new slimline, handbag-friendly book of days.

Being the sweet, old-fashioned thing that I am, this is an actual wee book so that between it, the tech-savvy phone calendar and a mighty desk tome that never sees the light of day beyond the home office, Himself and I might just be in with a chance of remembering when something momentous is due to happen before it actually does.

Boris Johnson, take note…

And that, dear reader, is partly what has inspired this move.

It is too late for me to resurrect the diary of 2020, long consigned to the dustbin of personal history.

But I am going to keep 2021’s somewhat threadbare record of times relatively recently past because I want, after the events of recent weeks, to know exactly where I was and what I was doing at any given moment of the last year.

And whether it was what I thought it was, either at the time, or later.

Being nominally retired, for example, I am unlikely to mix up notions of work and social life but it will be useful to have a primary source just to make sure I didn’t confuse productive employment for the public good with a bit of a private shindig involving carefully chosen social lubricants and a sense of rewarding myself for a job well done.

Or done at all, in any acceptable or useful way, shape or form which is a big leap in the current climate.

BYOB? The PM has, indeed bottled it now.

Bring Your Own Bluster/blag/betrayal, surely. Delete as applicable.

And of course, there is always the bittersweet amusement of looking back on a time when the prize entry on one particular day – and I give you December 30 2021 (evidence can be produced on request) – read: “Worm the dog.”

Worth keeping a record of that for future reference, or what?

Since I am not in public life, however, I can basically justify anything I did last year as being of no interest to anyone but myself.

In spite of the fact, like many other largely blameless members of the public, I stayed put and did without a lot of things, including the company of close family, friends and human contact, for the good of other people as well as myself and because it was the right thing to do.

Looking at the sparse entries for the past year actually makes me quite delighted to be one of those usually described as “ordinary people”.

And how deeply patronising is that terminology when you look at those supposed to be extraordinary who, again and again, just turn out to be extra ordinary.

Those who went along to now-infamous parties are also, probably, among those who went along with the party line that Johnson was the man of the hour to keep the party and thus, themselves, in power.

As an example of “be careful what you wish for”, it can hardly be bettered.

It’s just a shame it has left so many others so much worse off.

And not just financially.

I read an account by the actor Rory Kinnear this week of how he spent May 20 2020.

Burying his sister, who had died of Covid.

It reduced me to tears of sorrow and fury.

Why and how Boris Johnson’s shortcomings seemed to come as a surprise to many beats me, guv, and I’m far from the Brain of Britain.

But it wasn’t so much that those around him couldn’t see this coming, as didn’t want to see it coming.

It’s to be hoped that 2022 vision is better than 2020 vision was, even looking back at the diary in anger.

ARROGANCE: Boris Johnson and his government’s behaviour has disrespected those who died in the pandemic.