As the pandemic enters its third year, the idea of ‘normal’ seems a mirage

Sunday night (March 27), my wife and I met a friend for a leisurely dinner at a nearby Chinese restaurant, and for the first time, we felt a small sense of “normal.” We entered the restaurant without masks and spent 90 minutes there enjoying the food and catching up.
But, three years into the pandemic, that return to a true “normal” remains elusive at best.
Every time we’re told that cases are dropping sharply, it seems that the medical “experts” can’t wait to warn us about yet another variant with which they’re trying to keep people frightened, emotionally scarred and feeling uncomfortable.
(I understand that they're just doing their jobs, but could they possibly tone down their enthusiasm for announcing the new variants?)
After two doses of the vaccine and one booster --- and the likelihood looming of needing a second booster, followed by a regular annual shot similar to the flu --- it seems as if we’re never going to be done with COVID-19.
Yet, we can’t go on like this as a nation much longer. We can’t be worried that, every time we sneeze, we have to get tested, when those tests aren’t always conclusive, and when results from non-home tests still take up to 2-3 days to come back --- too late to start a lot of the much-hyped COVID medications.
And the virulence and hatred of the anti-vaxxers --- whose opposition to the COVID-19 vaccine mandates has frequently spilled over into antisemitism as they wrongly compare those mandates to the Holocaust and shamelessly target Jewish doctors, government officials and legislators --- is tearing apart the nation.

So, no, the pandemic is far from over, and its effects will linger for years, if not decades.
With COVID-19 deaths in the United States approaching the 1-million mark, I shared these pandemic-related observations as part of my March column in the Jewish Rhode Island of Providence:
Pandemic perspective: The opening paragraph of my first pandemic-related column two years ago, published online in March and in the April 2020 print edition of Jewish Rhode Island of Providence, now sounds like a huge understatement:

“Uncertainty abounds over the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, but one thing is certain: No matter how long the outbreak and its fallout last, it has already hurt the quality of our lives, and has made us care even more deeply about the kinds of activities that we otherwise take for granted.”

No one in 2020 could have predicted that, two years later, COVID-19 would have killed nearly 930,000 Americans (approaching the million mark as I post this); the virus would have caused so much havoc and division; and would have changed our lives forever.
Pandemic misses: I resumed road racing last summer, but these are among the activities the pandemic has taken from me: going to a baseball game (my last one was in September 2019); concerts (my last was in November 2019); and watch a movie in a theater (February 2020).
Pandemic fears: I still keep my distance from most people, and when I went to a neighbor’s holiday gathering last December, I wasn’t comfortable even though the adults had to be vaccinated to attend. My psyche is so battered after two years of the pandemic that I may never again feel comfortable around people indoors.