What's this about "normal"?

People keep talking about things being sort of normal this summer—and it's hurting my brain.

Anyone else kind of freaking out at the notion of life returning to normal-ish as more and more people get vaccinated?

Normal.

I am seeing the word being thrown around more and more, with articles promising that the summer is going to be glorious and wonderful and amazing and almost normal feeling: People gathering maskless at backyard barbecues! Screaming not just inside their hearts on roller coasters! Frolicking at the beach without having to give the stink-eye to people whose blankets and chairs are too close!

Hey, cool. What else? Ice blocks being delivered in horse-drawn wagons? Children chasing hoops down the street with sticks? Pantaloons?

So-called “Normal” life feels so quaint to me right now—so hazy and far away—that I am having a hard time wrapping my head around the fact that we might be experiencing something close to it in a few months, assuming the combo of new virus variants and relaxed restrictions doesn’t bite us in the ass.

I mean: Isn’t this normal? Masking and distancing and all Zoom, all the time? Feeling a persistent, low-grade sense of anxiety and disorientation? Having recurring nightmares about being in crowded places where nobody, myself included, is wearing a mask?

Granted, we’ll probably still be wearing masks and social distancing this summer and beyond. There will still be safety protocols and capacity restrictions. And personally, I probably won’t be going to indoor restaurants or theaters any time soon, even though legally I could. (Starting now in Massachusetts, in fact….something that makes me nervous.) I will probably not ride / scream on roller coasters, either, as much as I’d love to.

Fig. 1: Summer, 2021

But will I entertain friends indoors without fear? Possibly. Will I venture into the library, if it reopens, to browse the shelves? Hell yes. Will I no longer feel the urge to deck people at the grocery store who have their big stupid noses hanging out over the tops of their masks? Hahah, no, I’ll still hate those people. (But maybe slightly less?)

Meanwhile: Is it possible that I’ll regain my ability to think about the future? This whole past year, between the uncertainties of the pandemic and the various forms of social and political upheaval, I’ve felt very much anchored—mired, really—in the now. This week, this day, this hour.

If I was feeling really wild and crazy, I’d try to imagine what might happen in a month or two. But I can’t remember the last time I entertained thoughts of what might happen in several months or years from now, like I used to—trips I want to take, or things I want to do or accomplish.

I suppose this isn’t all bad; living in the now and whatnot. Though it often feels claustrophobic, there’s also been a sort of peace in living day to day; a stillness I don’t always mind. Blank weekend days on the calendar can be filled with spontaneous day trips or lazy afternoons spent de-cluttering, reading, or being slaughtered by my children and husband in Mario Kart. (I’m good at many, many things. Mario Kart is not one of them. Don’t even talk to me about Rainbow Road.)

I’ve been trying to suck the marrow out of the present moment to the best of my ability this winter in particular, self-medicating with high-dose snowshoeing and hiking. And carbs. (They cancel each other out.)

But now, suddenly, I’m being required to think about THE SUMMER—and actually managing to do it. The theater program and summer camp our kids, respectively, were hoping to attend are actually happening, and I put the dates on the calendar. The AMC high mountain huts, where I go with friends every year on a hiking adventure are slated to open, and I made a reservation. Rumor has it that the YMCA family camp we go to for a week every August will run, too. We’ve even started getting information from the schools about our kids picking classes for next fall. (Which will be their first year of HIGH SCHOOL, holy crap, and therefore shocking in its own right.)

What’s next? Am I going to start thinking about hosting Thanksgiving next Fall? Going to holiday parties? Taking a family trip ON AN AIRPLANE WITHOUT A MASK??

No. That last one goes toooooo far, my friends. The very idea of it seems positively primitive—akin to people dumping chamber pots into the manure-filled streets for children with hoops and sticks to run through.

So….I guess I’m cautiously excited (if that’s a thing), about the world starting to reopen and the horizon of time starting to widen in the months ahead. But if stuff gets too “normal,” too fast, I think I may pop a spring or blow a gasket or something. I wanna come out of this thing niiiiice and slow, like a little daffodil shoot popping its head out of the soil. A daffodil shoot with a mask on (over its mouth AND NOSE), smizing.

I don’t have a picture of me as a daffodil shoot with a mask on, so here’s another picture of me hiking — on a frozen Lonesome Lake, Franconia Ridge in the background.