When will we escape our coronavirus circles?

In the earliest days of lockdown, when we barely knew how much the world had changed, I struggled to take my daily exercise.

I joined in half-heartedly with the rest of the family as they tried out Joe Wicks and a range of other online regimes to get themselves moving in the morning. But I didn’t last a week.

Venturing outside felt wonderful yet perilous; and I rarely managed to find the time to head out in daylight hours. Eventually I found an evening routine, togging up with hat and scarf for a brisk turn around the block just before bed.

As time went by, and our children became ever more irritable and angry (or was it me), we made a point of going out together, usually in the early evening as the days lengthened. We found routes through woods and farmland that had previously been unknown to us.

Then, when we were able to use the car again, we went a little further afield, driving a few miles to favoured spots before putting on our boots and exploring new paths.

Yet this week, I have found myself once again returning to my evening walks around the streets closest to home – the same well-trodden circuit, at more or less the same time, when the kids are in bed and the day is at an end.

Things have changed of course since I walked the route habitually in March. Then, I marvelled at the stars and the utter, glorious silence. Now, I leave the house at 10 o’clock and darkness has not yet descended, and in the balmy warmth I can hear other people out and about – though I still see no one.

In the gloaming, pipistrelle bats flit to and fro; on Tuesday one came so close I ducked instinctively. They remind me of my childhood, when we would see them in the garden. They are as carefree now as they were then; more than can be said for us.

My son’s obsession with owls has rubbed off and every now and then I pause, looking around desperately in the hope of seeing one of those great sky beasts. A few years ago, we heard tawny owls regularly, but they evidently grew weary of the neighbourhood and moved on. Pigeons taunt me with their frequent appearances – they are not what I want.

Just as I did three months ago, on those dark, clear nights in March, I pause at the fence overlooking the nearby school. Shouts and laughter drift up from the recreation ground a little further down the hill: teenagers who don’t give a damn about social distancing, nor about binning their litter. But who can blame them for wanting a life?

On Monday, I spied a fox in the school grounds. I made a clicking noise to attract his attention and he looked about, presumably wondering why a strange man was mimicking a dolphin on heat. Our eyes met briefly, then he turned and scurried away.

With every restriction that eases, we should in theory feel more normal. But to me, each ministerial effort to return us closer to our ordinary existence (and there have been a few of late) is a reminder of just how much our lives have been altered – and just how far there is to go until we need no longer to worry about this awful virus.

Maybe this helps to explain why I have returned to my earlier regime in recent days, holding my immediate surroundings close, as if I can keep my bit of the world secure merely by patrolling its perimeter.

But we can’t walk in circles forever. Can we?