On a Sunday, if there were no family visitors, my late, independently minded mother, in her 80s, would get on a bus to stave off that creeping sense of depressing isolation, particularly associated with weekends, bank holidays and special occasions, a time when everyone else appears to be happily bonded in the company of others.
On the bus, for an hour or so, going wherever it took her, she would meet others similar in age to herself to pass the time of day, exchange neutral comments on the weather, EastEnders and the cost of a perm, and return home, cheerier, topped up by a little human connection. A lifelong royalist, what my mother would never have done is accept the sovereign’s invitation to this weekend’s Big Lunch or tomorrow’s single day of volunteering, The Big Help Out. A lot of people aren’t built that way. Nor are they of an age that makes it acceptable to use free transport to chat to strangers. But they are desperately lonely.
