First thing on a wet Monday morning ...

... and Leclerc is already heaving.  Like Christmas shopping, but without the jollity.

Until now, round here the only panic buying has been for hand sanitiser.  That's now changed.  Rows and rows of cream metal shelves are bare.  Every pack of every type of pasta has gone.  Understandable given that the children are now at home and there's suddenly a need for cheap mid-day meals.

For the first time, I see women wearing gloves - usually posh leather ones. The French must keep up appearances, even in a crisis. Others have woolly scarves wrapped high around their faces.  No medical masks to be had.  A woman hovers in front of the household gloves muttering: "jetables, jetables".  She smiles at me when I tell her there are no disposable gloves to be had now.

Other encounters are less friendly - the woman who weighs our fruit and veg had cancer some years back and she obviously feels vulnerable.  She brusquely tells the man in the queue in front of me to stand further away from her.  I hear distant angry voices at one of the tills - someone too close maybe.  We are learning to be afraid of our fellow human beings.

I buy myself two pairs of knitted gloves, on the basis that, in future, I can wear one pair and wash the other.  Not only do I feel a need to protect myself, but also to show others I'm taking care.  The gloves have "Love" sewn on them.  Seems appropriate somehow.

I avoid any of the supermarket trolleys, as I understand the virus can linger on the metal handles, just relying on my own lifetime bags, which means my "panic buying" is limited to whatever my two arms can support.  Is buying four butters for the freezer being greedy?

At the self-service check-out I am reassured to see one of the shop assistants wiping down the machines between each customer.  As I am finally packing, a young man in a security vest comes up behind me and wipes over the keys of the card reader.  Who knows whether any of this will help, but at least they are trying.

As I drive back along the ridge of our valley in the drizzle, I realise I have the same overwhelming feeling I experienced when 9/11 happened while I was out shopping - I just want to get home and be safe.

On arriving, the first thing I do is wash my hands thoroughly in hot soapy water.  And the next?  Make a cup of tea of course.  The British answer in moments of disaster.