Is it Over Yet?

Is it Over Yet?/27 January 2022/Lawrence S. DiCara

? Is it over yet? That is a question that many of us are currently pondering as we emerge from a month of record cases and record tragedy.?There will be life after Covid, but it will be different.?Some have become skeptical of the health care system and doctors and science in general, but it is very clear to anybody who can read that those who have been vaccinated are far less likely to get sick than those who have not. Yet it is the unvaccinated who are occupying hospital beds while others are told to wait their turn.

Our lives have changed. Many of us have learned to work at home. Many have simplified their lives, eliminating this membership or that membership.?Online shopping is convenient, but it de-personalizes us. We have learned to cocoon – to not associate with large numbers of people.?No one can really comprehend the damage to older people, especially those who live alone, as a result of these last two years.

When we think it is really over, we may revert to some of our old habits except we will find that some of the fraternal organizations which would offer hall rentals are no longer in existence because people are reluctant to join an organization in which they cannot participate.?Rotary, Kiwanis, Lions and such organizations, which always provided a platform for a young city councillor, may not exist when Covid is over. Even some book clubs might dissolve!

?Prof. Theda Skocpol wrote a book about the different organizations which men in a Maine town would attend every night, ostensibly for civic duty, but also to drink and smoke cigars and play cards.?The world that she outlined is history. DeTocqueville reported almost 200 years ago that in America, as opposed to the more established nations in Europe, citizens would routinely gather for a good cause, form a committee, etc. Some have concluded that civic involvement peaked shortly after the assassination of John F. Kennedy.

Nobody has studied the long-term impact of Covid on organized religion. For months, churches were closed. Will Sunday morning remain “sacred space?”

Will politics ever be the same if face to face contact is viewed with suspicion?

As one who had three daughters who were seniors in college when Covid hit, the college experience since Covid is very different for young people today than it was when I was at Harvard in the late 1960s.?One can listen to a lecture on a screen and might even benefit from doing so, but much of what I learned at college, I learned sitting around in friends’ rooms, admittedly late at night.?It is these unintended meetings that have a significant impact on one’s future life.

Younger children especially have become accustomed to not being in touch with relatives, especially grandparents, given the fear that older people might get sick and die.?Many younger children assume that everyone wears a mask all the time. Who knows whether many of us might continue to do so in some circumstances, such as airplanes and indoor sporting events?

America is a sturdy nation. We have endured lynchings in the South, riots in the North, a depression or two and more than our share of wars. A year or so ago, we survived an assault upon the Capitol by domestic terrorists, evidence of the partisan tribalism which threatens our democracy. We also found our way through a pandemic almost exactly 100 years ago. I am confident we will do so again.