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Imagine you’re talking to a couple of high school students in 2050. They ask, “How did the pandemic change the world as you knew it?” How do you think you would answer?

In some ways, it confirmed my most pessimistic suspicions. People denying the virus, refusing to wear masks, holding parties and rallies in tightly-packed indoor spaces. The kind of madness you expect to see in a twilight-zone type sci-fi film, but try to tell yourself isn't what would really happen. Our local YMCA permanently closed, where we were taking my son to learn to swim. Lots of local businesses had to close. I don't know. I don't feel that I have a good answer for this question right now, because I have a "before" and a "during," but no "after." So much of that "before-time" feels almost frozen in amber to me right now, even though I know the landscape will have changed when it's finally safe to resume life again. Right now I just stay in one place most of the time and don't experience very much of what's happening in the world.