Photographer captures the voice of the elderly during lockdown in Milton Keynes

Ruth Toda-Nation is a part-time carer to her father, who lives in an independent living facility for the elderly in Newport Pagnell.

"I wanted to give the elderly folk a voice," she said. "I’ve been photographically documenting and interviewing my father and the other residents on a regular basis, whilst social distancing in their shared garden," she said.

"The interviews state their feelings about the current situation and on-going isolation, and also make comparisons to their time during the war, including their memories of VE Day and their lives."

Ruth now hopes to put her photos and interviews together as a book.

"Any support towards the publishing of this - perhaps by a local company - would of course be fantastic," she said.

She is sharing some of her photos with Citizen readers and we will be publishing them over a couple of days this week.

Priscilla, aged 90, is pictured enjoying a stroll in the garden with the help of two walking sticks. She worked as the secretary to the Queen’s orthopaedic doctor before she retired.

She said: “It’s a very strange time because there’s nothing to do but it feels like there’s lots to do because there’s a lot happening in the world at the

moment. We have lost all our routines.

"I’m concerned for the future; I think it’s going to be very difficult and I feel sorry for the young people.

We can wander around here and see each other in the garden. With Captain Tom everyone can see that he represented an age, and that age has gone.

"I was brought up during the war, but the war also brought opportunities. I was not well off and I left school when I was 14. I became a secretary to a doctor. With my education I would never have got that job had it not been for the war. But this is very different now I’m not sure how it’s going to work out."

John, also aged 90, is an ordained minister and former missionary.

He said: “The air is so much cleaner and the birds seem to be singing more loudly or is it just that we are noticing it more?

"The main feeling that most of us have is that the world around us has changed. In the war we were encouraged to get together and we had to go down into an air raid shelter, but everybody would be sitting close to each other. Now I feel as if we are almost committing a crime if we try to get close to our neighbours or friends.

"I think this situation will cause us to appreciate people more. "We have got to know each other in the garden. I never really noticed the garden before. It is lovely so long as you don’t think that you are confined to it!”

"We are told to isolate which is quite difficult because as old people it’s quite lonely at the best of times. I watch the news and get a daily paper that I read each day. These things help me to keep in touch but it’s a very different world.

My feeling is that the government has been slow and should have introduced lockdown several weeks earlier.

Barbara and David are 82 and 85 respectively. Barbara is the mother of four children and John is a retired engineer.

They said: “We have had the most wonderful spring this year, Thank you God. It would have been more difficult in lockdown if the weather had been terrible. So good to be in our beautiful garden, enjoying the flowers, the birds and the peace.

"During the war everyone was in the same ‘boat’. Ration books made sure everyone had the same, although a great deal of bartering went on. I’m sure there was a difference between rich and poor but without the media to stir us up we were mostly content, and mostly the enemy had a uniform on and spoke a different language."

"It’s difficult to know how this pandemic will affect future generations. Do we want to go back to polluting the planet with plastic waste and air pollution from planes and cars? Who knows and I’m not sure that I’ll come out of lockdown.

"Friends and family have been so good. We might never have known they cared without coronavirus. There’s a thought.

"One thing that this strange time has given us is time to think, and of what we miss. I miss my mother and father although they died 28 years ago.

"In life I have learnt that nothing lasts. The bad times don’t last, and neither do the good times.”