Like many people I spend time thinking about where we are going and where this will all end. The road toward “normal” is unknown. 

I can hardly write anything with a hint of the future because the situation changes so rapidly. Two weeks ago there were virtually no cases of COVID-19 in the province and then a couple of mistakes and we are back at a B117 variant outbreak and Level 5 lockdown. I write this and it will see print in a week. Who knows what the latest will be then?

2:00 ^AM whisky wisdom

I can tell you though that in the wisdom of what Roger Kahn called “the wisdom in a 2 AM whisky” that things will never ever be the same again. 

There will be a vaccine for everyone, but the time frame? I don’t know. Will the virus mutate again? Will the vaccines remain effective? All questions with the same answer: I don’t know. I do know that waiting for a return to normal may be waiting in vain. Things are different. 

The way the whole world operates has changed, as has my narrow world. In that world at 2 AM are a thoughts about a restaurant buffet. I’m not at all sure that I will ever get back to the buffet table under ANY circumstances.  

I am off track here a bit, but I love buffet dining. I have been to them here in this province in various forms and other places in the world like China or England or France or Cuba. I was even to a buffet in Iceland which was very odd. 

One thing I had was salt cod, not watered, but deep fried. I drank a lot of beer there. It will be a very long time before I would even consider eating at a buffet in Iceland or anywhere else. 

‘The all clear?!’

I have spent a year social distancing and covering my face with a mask and avoiding handling food cooked by other people. Don’t hold your breath for me to stand in line with other humans with trays of food in a restaurant. Long after the government gives what used to be called “the all clear,” I’ll be home cooking for myself. Perhaps the fault is mine, but that is the way it is. Wearing a mask I suspect now will be a matter of lifestyle and not the result of a government directive. You know I watched people 20 years ago in China wear masks when coal smoke was wafting over the cities. People just wore masks. I think that is where we are headed. 

“Normal” won’t be this year and it won’t be next. Things will never be the same again.