Some of you will probably know I'm currently grieving. It's a month since my fantastic sister died. I've been thinking a lot about loss, progress and reckoning and coming to terms, both personally and as a society. And I've been wondering: how will we remember the pandemic dead?

The UK is filled with memorials to the dead of wars, of disasters, of lifeboat crews and atrocities. We are a landscape haunted by attempts to remember the brave and the innocent. Villages, towns, businesses, communities: all grouped together to pay for plaques, statues, gardens

I have a terror that in our desire to get 'back to normal' we will forget those lost and things lost during the current pandemic. There's not an enemy they were overcome by; not a single flashpoint of tragedy. Those lost to the pandemic are an uncomfortable reminder of failure

Rebecca Solnit talks about hope only coming from knowing history. People may be optimistic about the future post-covid-19, but that's just desire and dream. For us to build a hopeful future we need to acknowledge and feel what has been lost; to repair and grow, not just erase

The thing is, I don't know if our communities know how to remember what is lost, not in ways that are meaningful to all of that community. Religion is a great enabler of remembrance, but that's not something everyone has. I'm wondering how we fully inhabit our collective sorrow