My 91-year-old mother has been alone for 12 weeks. I desperately want to visit her

Of course what I really want to do is what I’ve always done: pack a bag, pick up dinner and a bottle of wine from Euston and arrive at my mum’s just in time for a late lunch, writes Jenny Eclair

The writer with her mother before lockdown (Jenny Eclair)

For some reason the past week has been one of the toughest. It all went wrong when I accidentally sprayed my potted roses with weedkiller. As soon as I realised, I frantically hosed down the plants, desperately trying to rinse them clean of the bad stuff. The next day they looked fine but, as my partner explained, it was too early to tell. Apparently the poison travels through the leaf, into the stems and down to the root and that’s when the dying begins. Oh God, why does everything have to be a metaphor for coronavirus?

The next day the weather broke. How typical of the UK that the moment we’re allowed to meet up in groups of six in parks or gardens, the one thing we need on our side decides to play dirty.

Immediately all those plans up and down the country for splurging out on new patio furniture and state of the art barbecues began to crumble – what’s the point in novelty paper plates when heavy showers mean shivering in your coat and peeing in the bushes? Because the whole lavatory thing turns out to be a complete minefield.

Yes, guests can use your loo, but it must be properly cleaned afterwards. Much easier to direct them to a tree, unless, of course, they need a poo. Oh God.

And so the complications of semi-lockdown continue. You can take limitless exercise – but you can’t be arsed – and you can travel as far as you like in England to visit friends and family but you can’t stay the night.

This last rule is causing me the most grief at the moment. My mother, who turned 91 last month, has been on her own now for more than 12 weeks. She is visited every Monday by two incredibly generous and kind women, both with families and lives of their own, who clean and shop for her, whilst religiously maintaining social distancing.

Over the past week they returned twice more to her flat when she had an emergency with her fridge-freezer, saving the day yet again with their calm efficiency. Meanwhile the guilt and uselessness I felt two 250 miles away was exhausting. I haven’t cried much since this all kicked off but I cried over this bloody stupid fridge problem.

Because the fact is I am allowed to visit her, I’m just not allowed to hang out with her in the flat or stay the night.

If I wasn’t scared of public transport, I could put on gloves and a mask, steel my bladder for a long, uncomfortable trip and reach her via a couple of trains. I could wave at her through the window or maybe even tempt her out into the chilly seafront communal garden. There, she could sit on a bench with the wind blowing in from the sea and I could yell at her from a safe two-metre distance. I could then return to London. But my mother is insistent that this is a ridiculous idea.

Of course what I really want to do is what I’ve always done: pack a bag, pick up dinner and a bottle of wine from Euston and arrive just in time for a late lunch. My mother will have made soup, because she is a most excellent soup-maker. After lunch we will sit on the sofa and I will hold her hand and maybe I’ll file her nails and we’ll bicker over the fact she refuses to speak to Alexa or we might take a taxi to see my 94-year-old aunt who lives a couple of miles away and is good on family gossip. In the evening, we will drink the wine and I will cook the ready meals I bought at the station and my mother will finish her meal with a mini Magnum. Neither of us stay up late, so we will turn in after the news headlines at 10 and in the morning my mother will be up and dressed and making more soup before I’ve even thought about starting the day.

That’s what I want to do. These half measures are a step in the right direction but for some of us they pose tricky dilemmas. My partner has offered to drive me there and back, but it’s a 500-mile round trip and could take 12 hours. Oh, and before you ask, I don’t drive on motorways because of a stupid crashing phobia, so I can’t share the driving and in any case I’m scared of his car and we can’t use my old banger because it died back in March and so it goes on.

I know that, by comparison to many, my family is incredibly fortunate: no one has died and even my roses are still alive a week after the accidental poisoning.

In fact, I’ve just checked and there are a couple of new green shoots by the roots – maybe it’s a sign that things really will get better? I do hope so, because I’ve got a couple of spare pairs of knickers and an overnight bag that are raring to go.