It's been a while. In the meantime the world has been involved in a pandemic which has had us tail spinning.
Two years ago today the first cases of Covid-19 in Europe were discovered in Codogno in the north of Italy. It spread very quickly, Borders were closed, flights cancelled, travel suspended while the rest of Italy (and Europe) held its breath.
No-one knew what to do, something like this had never happened before and there was no known cure, and for a long while no vaccine. Healthcare workers worked overtime, stretched to their limits in an effort to save as many people as they could putting their own lives at risk. Italy went into lockdown. At one point the number of deaths in the region of Bergamo was so high that the army was brought in to take away the bodies. Europe looked on with scepticism, surely it could not happen here, they thought. After all, it was Italy that had been hit, and no-one can deny that Italy has a reputation.
All sorts of announcements were made by politicians in Europe on how deadly the virus was (e.g. it wasn't much worse that the flu, and soon we would have herd immunity), and what we should do about it (not much).
But of course it did happen.
The 'war cry' in Italy became 'andrà tutto bene' (all will be well), the symbol became a rainbow. Flags draped balconies and people sang 'Ciao bella, ciao', a song sung by resistance fighters in the second world war. in the whole of Europe children were sent home from school to follow online lessons, people were encouraged to work from home. In the US President Trump encouraged people to use bleach. Some drank it and died.
Of course there was more, lots more. But there's also this. Somehow, and I don't know exactly why, something else also happened: curves flattened, and not just the curve of the pandemic..
Let's have a look at 'normal' and what defines it.
In very simple terms it means that most of us fall into close to 70% of the population, sharing certain characteristics such as height etc. Taking height as an example we can expect 13.5% to be taller that the average height of the 70%, and 13.5% to be shorter. Those who fall further away from those percentages can be considered exceptions.
I don't want to make this more complicated than it is. It's turning into a long post.
The thing is, the curve can change. The battle cry in the UK was: ;flatten the curve', what that meant was that the amount of people who were infected was causing the curve that measured the number of infected people to spike. Sow know we can influence the curve. Phew..
Where am I going with this..
Something that I have noticed, not sure if I'm the only one here (I don't think I am), is what has been happening with other curves.
The concept of female/male has changed, the gender debate has upturned the female/male binary to make it analogue. I'm told only sex is binary. If you don't agree you get ostracised.
The concept of work has changed. The divide between those who can work at home and those who can't have become greater. The Great Resignation is a signal of that.
The concept of race and ethnicity has changed. What is okay and not okay is morphing. Not sure where it ends or even begins. It's okay for black actors to play white roles, but not the other way around? Or have I got that wrong?
The concept of school has changed. You no longer go to school to learn, you sit in your bedroom in front of a screen.
There has been a (perceived or real?) increase of violence, especially by boys towards girls. Too much Netflix or GTA? In an environment where you can only interact with others and the rest of the world through a screen, what happens to your sense of what is real? And where is the 'socially acceptable' curve? I dunno...
And now we heave a sigh of relief that Covid is just about over, we can deal with energy crises and the threat of war.
New normal.
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