Last Sunday I got my second Covid jab, and relief doesn’t even begin to describe what I felt. It truly feels like the end of this year-long nightmare is finally getting closer, and I can’t wait to resume some activities I haven’t felt comfortable with for over a year.
I’ve got one more week to go until I’m considered fully vaccinated, and I’m already looking forward to my first hugs in over a year, to eating out again, and to having vaccinated friends over for a meal or movie night. I know Allegra is looking forward to having visitors again, too.
I really hope that I will never take all of these things for granted again. We’re still not back to where we were a year ago, and maybe we will never get back to that normal. And maybe that’s not such a bad thing. Maybe this is our opportunity to create a new normal that serves us better. Even if we haven’t lost any loved ones to this awful disease, we’ve all lost something. We’ve all had to make some pretty profound changes to our daily routines.
Perhaps this is a good time to evaluate what to keep and what to leave behind as we move toward a hopefully less scary future, and, dare I hope, a more joyful life.
Is there something you changed about your life during the pandemic that you want to take with you into a post-pandemic world?