My sister messaged me. She has it on ‘good authority’ that there’s likely to be a petrol shortage next week so it’s well worth filling up.
“Goodo,” I texted back. “Though my car runs on hopes and prayers these days so I’ll probably be alright thanks.”
Actually I’m still driving around on last week’s full tank (yet to dip below the F). Plus I’m trying not to use the car quite so much. Especially after I bashed into next door’s mini.
Oh by the way, she phoned me back! I was fetching a baking tray at the time so I missed the call, but she left me the sweetest voice message telling me not to worry too much about it. See? People are nice!
We really need kindness at the moment. Exhausted from one global crisis, we’re being dumped on by another. As one tweeter put it: Brexit, Coronavirus, and now World War 3; what’s next, aliens?
If they’ve got any sense, the aliens, they’ll take one look at us and reverse out of the solar system like a Ford Focus in a cul-de-sac.
It’s not World War 3 though. Not yet. There’s an interesting dilemma faced by the West on how to help Ukraine without actually fighting the Russians. Sitting back feels like letting Putin roam free across Eastern Europe; getting involved seems a short way to start a long war. I believe I am a pacifist but somehow, you’ve also got to see the Churchill point of view - and be ready to fight aggressors on the beaches if it should come to it. Otherwise evil is left to stalk the land and we will be the ones who have let it happen.
Meanwhile, cold and calculating in his winter palace, Putin is playing chess like a seasoned grandmaster. He seems almost unfazed by his opponents: inscrutable, solid, controlled. And it might just be dawning on us that he’s been playing us for quite some time.
Anyway, let’s not get into all of that.
“Excellent,” replied my sister, typically unwilling to indulge my sense of humour about my car running on hope instead of petrol.
I can’t blame her for that. In a way, hope and prayers are a lot better as fuel, especially at times like these.
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