Pandemically Adjusting.

I am so excited and overwhelmed at the same time. Getting back to meeting people in real life (not in front of a screen but with their actual bodies in the same room as mine), going back to university, makes me anxious even though I was looking forward to that every day for 1.5 years. After three semesters exclusively online, I have to relearn some social skills like how to talk to people I am not that close with. Currently I feel like I talk to strangers, lecturers, and even my employer as if we are the bestest friends. I constantly go from oversharing to shutting down completely, which makes no sense. Furthermore, I need to gain control of my face again so that not everybody knows when I am annoyed (get yourself together and save the eye-rolling for Harry Potter, eh).

Though, it makes my heart light to be in a room full of people, I need at least a day of alone time after that, in which I often do nothing at all except recharging. Then, I feel like an unproductive fool, which increases my stress level. It sure does not help that politicians and other people in power hardly care about university students. That is why they send us back from zero – complete shutdown – to literally hundred – full presence, full classes. Am I ready for that? Am I prepared? Not by any stretch of the imagination, I can picture myself living a pre-Covid life, in which it was usual to work a few hours, have lectures, meet friends, and learn and prepare for other lessons all in one day. How did I even do that? How was that possible? Was the day longer than 24 hours back then?

On top of all that, the pandemic is not even over. Not in Germany, not in the US, not globally. People still die from Covid-19 every day. But yes, [insert anti-vaxxer of your choice], let us discuss in detail why you do not want to get vaccinated after 4,885,989 deaths due to Covid-19 worldwide. I cannot believe that I have to defend Bill Gates, whom I personally detest for the very reason of being a billionaire as billionaires are a product of capitalism (no one deserves that much money and a system that allows this is screwed to its core) from accusations of implementing a micro-chip via a vaccine? Are you kidding me? You use Microsoft on your laptop every day. Don’t you think there are easier ways to track you, gain control of you than a vaccine? Is inventing a vaccine not far too effortful and obvious when Gates already has the means of millions of people having his programme installed anyway? Not to mention that you spread your nonsense conspiracy theories on FACEBOOK and in WHATSAPP groups. What kind of cognitive dissonance even is this?  I usually try to avoid conspiracy theorists, Covid-19 disbelievers (as if you could choose to believe in science, haha), and anti-vaxxers but it turns out they are everywhere. They are politically left or blunt Nazis, poor, middle-class or rich, academics or workers. They a relative of mine, a teacher(!). And even if people are not Covid-denying hardliners, I had to listen to some dreadful stuff. People comparing the privileges that come with being vaccinated (=going shopping, eating inside restaurants, not having to get tested, etc.) with apartheid, with the yellow star Jews had to wear during the Hitler regime in Germany, with genocide. What kind of cognitive dissonance even is this? To be clear, the vaccine should ideally prevent you from catching a dangerous disease in the first place, eases your symptoms, and aims at preventing you from dying. Your comparisons are racist, anti-Semitic, and extremely stupid and manage to reverse the status of victim and perpetrator. To be clear, you are not the victim but actually put others at risk by not being vaccinated. I can assure you that the worst you get with not being vaccinated (despite probably Covid) is not being able to put other people in danger of catching a life-threatening virus. In contrast to apartheid, a system that forcefully segregated Black people, refused them basic human rights, imprisoned, and murdered them, you will continue to stay in your flat, to go grocery-shopping, to live. You will not be forcefully displaced and gassed to death in concentration camps. Quite the contrary, you can even continue to babble your bullshit on every platform you want and protest freely on the streets without getting shot. While especially (not exclusively) Western countries hold a PhD in ignoring and/or understating crises like the imminent climate apocalypse, rape culture, right-wing populism, racism etc., the pandemic is yet another example of politicians failing and groups of people deciding their own truths that only benefit themselves. The Covid-19 pandemic, however, is likely to only be the beginning. As the ecological crisis accelerates and wild animals and humans have to close ranks habitat-wise, unknown viruses will spread from animals to humans regularly. Luckily, we collectively handle this pandemic so well that other pandemics will surely be easier. *Sarcasm off.

To end on a comforting level at least for me, I will quote Harry Styles’ Sign of the Times. If you listen to it on repeat, it starts to make sense to any situation.

“Just stop your crying

It’s a sign of the times

Welcome to the final show

Hope you’re wearing your best clothes

[…]

Just stop your crying

It’ll be alright

[…]

Will we ever learn?

We’ve been here before

It’s just what we know”

Theresa M. F.