Thoughts and Observations from a Period I’ll Never Forget
As this blog is posted and becomes available on my website, I am sitting at the New Jersey shore house my wife and I have rented during the last full week of June for the last several summers. Except last year at this same time, it was not a typical last week of June, or a typical summer. We chose not to do the summer rental. We were sheltering in place like a large number of people. We were afraid to do much of anything for fear of catching the Corona Virus.
In fact, the last calendar year plus, has not been a typical anything. The Greatest Generation had World War II and the “Great Depression.” While I was alive during the Vietnam war, I was relatively young compared to those who were actually doing the fighting or protesting against the war in the United States. Certainly 9/11/2001 was an event that I will never forget in my lifetime, and while it changed the “security” levels that we now have at all public activities, it actually led to a bonding together of people the likes of which I don’t think we have seen since.
As we progress through 2021, and we try to return to some sense of “normalcy,” I’m not so sure such an item exists. Yes, I have been vaccinated as have been many that I know. However, there are those I know who have chosen to “never be vaccinated” against a virus for which there is no other known way to address at this point. I have begun to travel a bit again, (family events out of state in April and May), but have only chosen to do so by automobile, and not via an airplane. Even this week at the New Jersey shore has its “uncertainties” to it for my wife and me. The week is one which not only has us spending time at our shore house, but also with many members of my wife’s family. A typical week has time at the beach during the day, and alternating family dinners at night. However, this year, will all the usual attendees be there? Will there be family dinners? Have other items, some the result of the year-long pandemic, others due to life in general, impact both who will be at beach week and how they will participate?
While much has been written about whether one must wear, or does not have to wear a mask in public scenarios, post pandemic, if they have been vaccinated, I find that I have become conditioned, “by habit,” to make sure I have a mask with me, to put it on as I enter a public building or if I am in crowded public outdoor environment. What was “the new” 12 to 15 months ago, adapted into the normal, and it is not always easy to go back. For example, I was one who likely used cash more often than others when making many of my purchases. However, for the last 15 months, I rarely used cash, (only for purchases under $10 where I would let the merchant “keep the change”). I have not used coin in the last 15 months. It has become natural for me to use my credit cards for most anything I buy. Again, much like the way I used to operate was habit, I find it difficult to “just like that,” change what has become normal and go back to the way I used to do things.
Additionally, I attempt to have a “sensitivity” to others that I meet, many of whom I may not have spoken to in months, or certainly have met in person over the last year. Is it possible they may have been ill from the virus itself, or had a relative or friend that was seriously ill? Is it possible that they may have a relative that has passed away from the virus, or had lasting effects that still impact them? The sensitivity takes the nature of not “assuming” that your experiences with an event or item is the same as others. In addition, there is just the reality that all people need to deal with what they have experienced, “in their own time.”
I guess the greatest observation that I have taken from the last 12 to 15 months, and it definitely sadden me, is “the animosity” that people often felt for others that disagreed with them in terms of how they chose to respond to the pandemic. I never felt wearing a mask impacted my freedom. I always felt that in some way it was symbolic that we were all in this unexpected event together, and I had as much responsibility to look out for the other person, as well as myself. And, while I know going over a year with your life and moves impacted, it is still a short time in the overall scheme of things when you consider the history of society itself.
Here is to hoping that we not necessarily “go back to the way things were,” but more so go forward with a new awareness and sensitivity. We are not “in charge” of everything that happens to and around us. Things may happen, and may require of us actions that we do not like to take. However, we all have each other, and the sooner we learn to work in harmony with each other, as opposed to opposition, the better we will be prepared to handle the next major worldwide event when it happens.
