We need to mark the countless lives Covid has claimed. But how to do it? | Laura Spinney

I'm struck by the beauty of a tribute to the dead of all pandemics - the ones forgotten and the ones still to come

Just over two years ago, my friend Janet came over to commiserate with my husband, whose leg was in plaster after a road accident. We immediately noticed a change in her. This sharp, funny woman in her mid-60s, who had nothing good to say about men (with the exception of her three beloved sons, whom she had raised almost single-handedly) had softened.

Not only was she happy, we realised, but it may have been the first time we had ever really seen her that way. She soon admitted she was in love. She couldn't get over the fact that she had met the man in question, even if it had happened relatively late in life. Her happiness was infectious. It was a jewel of an evening that only shines more brightly in my memory because of what happened next.