Opinion: Ruth Wishart on what Covid-19 has taught us

And that has resonated in spades for what, unbelievably, has been virtually a lost year in so very many ways.

It was three weeks into March 2020 when the lockdown shutters came down for the first time; a classic case, as we were to learn in the most painful of ways, of locking the stable doors after way too many horses had bolted.

Yet we knuckled down, devised ever more innovative ways of accessing sport and culture online, and believed that if we could just, all of us, keep the heid, there would be a swift enough reprieve.

Our discipline was helped by very unusual Scottish spring weather, warm enough to see folks out of doors, and to sit in the balm of warm sunlight. Those of us lucky enough to have a garden could enjoy lots of daily fresh air and the unmistakeable signs of fresh life and colour.

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And, you know, we almost got away with it. By summer time in Scotland we had beaten back the virus, and even the gloomiest epidemiologist was predicting that if not exactly home free, we were certainly at the final bend.

We know the rest, only too well. The opening up of trade and social lives, coupled with the advent of thousands of staycationers, added to by travellers from abroad, soon proved that dawn to be false.

Proved that if we let down our guard, without full enough knowledge about hidden hazards like symptom-free spreaders and ease of transmission, then the virus could get a stranglehold again. And so we were to endure a second, and then a third, set of limitations on our normal liberty.

This lost, last year has been a hard one. Hardest of all for those bereaved by Covid. Hugely stressful for the medical and social care front line fighting an all pervasive enemy on our behalf and facing the kind of daily toll normally only dealt with for a few weeks in a bad winter.

The weekly Clap for Carers was a afeature of the early months of the pandemic (Andrew Milligan/PA Wire)

Tough for those living in residential care, and the family and friends who have been banished from their lives. Tough for all of us desperate for a hug from those we care most about.

And, though they get few thanks for it, tough for all the politicians who have had to take the kind of decisions none of us would care to face.

So this week, once again, they have had to roll the dice over easing our lockdown. In Scotland and Wales, the youngest children are back at school, and let’s not forget that for the very youngest pupils, the virus has stolen a quarter of their young lives.

Our lives have changed in a way no-one could remotely have imagined 12 months ago

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Early next month, England will take an even bigger gamble, letting all pupils start at once.

As I say, these are decisions none of us would care to make. Decisions which affect not just their own family, but the families of entire nations. Literally life and death decisions.

It’s said that this lost, last year has taught us what is really important in life. It has certainly taught us WHO is the most important. Who does the jobs that society most needs, and who, ironically, tends to be at the back of the queue when the financial rewards are handed out.

Social distancing has left many people feeling mentally as well as physically isolated

Not just the caring professionals – all of whom would swap six months of doorstep applause for a decent pay rise – but the folks who have delivered our basic needs in this new online world. One of the few employment areas which has expanded exponentially these last 11 months has been delivery drivers, while school staffs have had to re-invent themselves.

The other thing we’ve surely learned is that wise injunction, “carpe diem” – seize the day. How many of us have turned down opportunities for social interaction in the past because we couldn’t be bothered? There would always be another time.

Until, suddenly, devastatingly, there wasn’t. Carpe diem.