Hello, Normal!

We've been waiting forever for this pandemic to end. If not the end, we've certainly been waiting to be vaccinated.

Now that many of us are on the vaccine train or disembarking from it, we are scratching our heads wondering, now what? We're used to isolation. We know the rules. We stay away, we don't congregate, we don't dine in, we don't shop indoors.

Remind me again what do we do, what is normal? At this point, my list of don'ts is longer than my dos!!

Reintegration is like going out the stock market and then not knowing when to get back in. Dr. Fauci says it is ok for fully vaccinated people to mix. Great, but what if there is one un-vaxed person? Do we say no? Dr. Sanjay Gupta recently wrote an article on this and left me confused.

When we are around our kids, we do a lot more because they make normal seem possible. They aren't intimidated by the germ and they believe in the vaccine. We are still skittish about the germ and even though the right side of the brain trusts the vaccine, the left side waves a flag with "variants" written in font size 200.

But, it is time to get back to normal, whatever that is!

I am less nervous about going to pick up mail from our PO box but still anxious about going into stores. After I get back into the car with the mail, I still bathe in hand sanitizer. Will this ever stop? Will I go inside stores? Will I fly without a mask?

Yes, yes, probably not.

My new mantra is “flu shot”. Getting the flu shot does not mean we will not get the flu. It means we could have a muted reaction. The covid vaccine, unlike the flu shot, isn't a guess. It knows what the virus looks like and creates antibodies that can attack that very form. We are far safer with this vax than after the flu shot. Despite that, there is a tiny chance we could get the disease but our bodies will be prepared for the onslaught.

So, hello to a new normal and cheers to reintegration...slowly, steadily, safely. I won't push myself but I also won't hold back. I will keep that mask on and hand sanitizer at the ready. ‘Cos deadly microbes are everywhere and they don’t give a hoot about our freedom!