Hey, Dallas! Are You Ready for 'The New Normal?'

DALLAS, TX —Some total stranger is huffing and puffing next to you on the stairclimber. Are you okay with that? Some lady you've never seen before is right up on your rump at the supermarket checkout. Is that cool? Someone is coughing behind you on the bus. Seriously?

These days, if you're vaccinated, you should be able to shrug all those inconveniences off and go about your day. But a lot of Dallasites, like a lot of Texans and a lot more Americans, don't see it quite that way.

After a year of shutdowns, lockdowns, quarantines and working and learning from home, many are finding returning to life as it was is not so simple.

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And having the CDC change its masking recommendations last week didn't end the anxiety. In many instances, the new regulations only made matters worse. Because masks and social distancing were politicized from the beginning of the pandemic, you have vax deniers mingling with the unvaccinated and those who have been fully immunized for months.

Under the "old normal," you'd take refuge in the nearest swimming pool and stay submerged until the need to drink your margarita before it melts calls you to the surface. Maybe you'd slip off to a matinee to sit in the cool dark with buttered popcorn and a soda the size of a small child while an Avenger avenges something you'll forget about a half hour after leaving the theater.

Or you might just get in your car and drive —forever, with the radio blaring all the way in any direction you choose. Except that now, with the pipeline interruption and gas prices soaring, the fuel to get you anywhere is going to set you back a pretty penny.

So... what to do? We're all wondering the same thing. What's truly safe? Vaccinated people can still contract COVID-19and pass the virus on to someone who's not been inoculated. That person could then get sick, suffer long-term consequences or die — all while passing their germs on to countless others.

What does seem to work, and work best, is to know that no matter who you are, where you are, or what your beliefs, you're not alone. If you deny that the pandemic was ever real, you have plenty of company. And at the other end of the spectrum, if you've lost someone you cherish, there are now 50,000 fellow Texans who know something of your grief and anguish. For the record, that's close to the number of people living in Galveston.

Lastly, if you're one of the 30 percent of Texans vaccinated, you can breathe a little bit easier with family and friends. It's not over, but it's the beginning of the end. How we'll recognize "the new normal" is likely to happen so incrementally that one day, we'll finally begin to discuss in the past tense without ever realizing we're doing so.

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