Durban - Tried for days. A week, even. But failed in the end.
I could not find anything within my (current, until the bank repossess them) four walls to write about that doesn’t involve that bedamned, bedevilled, behated (surely these ARE real words) virus.
But upon my walls I found an answer which only skirts around this catastrophe - bookshelves.
Being a newshound means we have to keep up to date with what is going on, have as many sources as possible to verify anything before we publish it, and take social media with a shovel of salt and high doses of cynicism.
TV news channels are prime targets for us to get as wide a view on local and world opinions, debates and reports as possible, and turn them into stories that are relevant to our readers.
Most presenters, pundits, opinionistas, health experts, politicians (unfortunately yes, them too) are Skyping or Zooming or whatever for their daily slots or TV interviews.
In the doom, gloom and disaster, I’ve had to - for what’s left of my sanity - find something in these crossings to keep my spirits up.
I found it on their bookshelves.
As with Facebook, Instagram
et al, people mostly only show their best sides. You are so not going to be “invited” into a home with a corner or a desk that hasn’t been spruced up and “arranged”, even to a small degree.
But behind these TV folk are rows and rows of books. And they are all on perfectly straight bookshelves.
Some, like CNN’s international editor Nic Robertson, has books on one shelf so perfectly lined up, all exactly the same height, I keep wondering if they’re sort of like old audio DVDs, in boxes, placed with a spirit level.
Others are in a little more disarray, but the titles (those you can see, anyway) are hefty tomes sure to frame the commentator as an extremely well-read, brilliant scholar (or even author of some of the visible titles). And they may be.
Now if that’s not intimidating as it is, the shelves themselves, packed as some are, have absolutely, totally, no sign of any sag.
I have several bookshelves that I built with my dad. Three stretch from the floor to the ceiling, while another is a half-wall.
I have about six others of various sizes, two of them home-made and four which I bought because I had no more walls to build on and needed these to scatter around.
I had to do the home-made ones on a budget, so, granted, they are all painted chipboard, and my late dad’s workmanship was in no way to blame. But I could never set up a Skype/Zoom session in front of mine because they are almost
half-moons of sag.
And dusty.
The thing with being a bibliophile is that you “collect” books; you never know when someone may need to borrow a book you have read. Or you may want it for reference or refresher. But it’s not every day you visit
your bookshelves and suddenly, when you do, you find they need a “wash”.
So I would be too embarrassed to do the video thing in front of the books.
And forget about a video call from the couch: all you’d get is the five pooches trying to sit next to mom.
Just e-mail me, okay?
- Slogrove is the news editor