‘Then the roof fell in’: My Covid fight

There was all this talk about Covid, claiming that chaps who were over seventy and not underweight were vulnerable. I would nod sagely, never thinking that this could apply to me. Like a lot of men, when it comes to physique or romance I have a secret appeal court, to override the harsh judgments of birth dates and the shaving mirror. It assured me that I would not catch Covid. 

Yet around the turn of the year, I kept on getting intimations and twinges. Full-blown Covid symptoms? No. Taste? Fine. Smell? Fine. Occasional cough but hardly so you would notice. But I was not happy. Was this plague, or hypochondria? The latter did not seem impossible. I was tested – a brush at the back of the throat variety – and passed, without feeling reassured. Then, slowly but inexorably, the roof began to fall in.

I was with friends – a wholly legitimate, scrupulously bubbled business meeting – when the crisis approached.