The air quality here in Washington, D.C., has been subpar (though not atrocious) the past few days as a result of the Canadian wildfires. I assume most people have managed just fine with the hazy air, but for whatever reason, I developed really awful chest pain and a scratchy throat. (If anyone has suggestions for clearing this up, please let me know.)
I wanted to avoid the outdoors entirely, although I did have to leave my apartment a few times over the weekend. I unearthed a pandemic-era relic stuffed in one of my drawers: A disposable mask. I wasn’t sure whether it would help with my chest and throat problems, but I figured it couldn’t possibly make things worse.
The flimsy face covering resuscitated some uncomfortable memories from the Covid-19 days. Do you remember how the Mask Police militantly enforced the most ridiculous guidelines? One particular instance really stands out to me, and it somehow still evokes feelings of rage. The hostess at a restaurant in Princeton, New Jersey, made my friends and me wear a mask for the 20 or so seconds she escorted us from the front entrance to our table inside; we were then permitted to un-mask once seated. The logic, I guess, was that we couldn’t spread the virus once sitting down because the virus respects the sanctity of the dinner table, just as it didn’t spread at BLM rallies because those enlightened protesters had immunity by virtue of their very moral cause. (But religious services were somehow super spreaders, and therefore churches needed to be heavily regulated.)
Honestly, I still have difficulty accepting how totalitarian the pandemic era was, and how obviously ridiculous some of the policies were. And yet we were condemned for not “trusting the science.”