I keep hearing how everything is finally getting back to normal now. Praise jeebus, everything is getting back to the way it should be.

Packed shopping centers, commuting, being stuck in traffic, having to be around swarms of people – is that what you want? That is the normal you strive for?

Nah mate.

I kind of feel like people are trying to force a square peg in a round hole, and then when it is jammed in there they exclaim “See! Perfect”, everything is normal again. Like we can wash away the trauma of the last two years by being miserable like we used to be. Like we’re perpetually being that smile crying pic of Selena Gomez – “it’s back, we’re normal, I’m happy now”

It’s just all so interesting to me. On the one hand I get it, the last two years have been hella traumatic. For everyone. For varying reasons. The thing with trauma though is that it changes you and you need to acknowledge that and deal with it. Like, have you ever had a loved one pass away, and all you want is to have some form of normalcy in your life, so you force it – you go back to work too early and next minute you’re sitting at your desk ugly crying to Evanescence? (No? Too specific? Just me then)

The point is we can’t go back. And forcing it is making me fucking anxious as fuck.

I don’t know. What the fuck even is normal anyway? Why do we want to go back to it? I missed being able to leave my house, I missed my friends, I missed things – but I find that now I’m missing my alone time.

After 2 years of actively not going to crowded places, I don’t necessarily feel super comfortable sitting in a sea of mouth breathers. I mean, anxiety aside, covid still exists, the numbers are through the roof, our hospitals are full, and I don’t want to risk it. How am I the freaking weird one for feeling that way? It’s like people are so desperate to “go back to the way things were” that they’re ignoring the state of the world. Like kids sticking their fingers in their ears screaming “la la la not listening”

Whatever. I don’t know. You do you, but let me do me.

Can we just skip to that part where everyone realises that flexibility in work is the way forward, that saying no to going places is acceptable, and that the only way society is going to improve is by embracing the discomfort of change and adapting. Stop trying to make me be someone who stopped existing in March 2020.