With Dr. Fauci and other highly-regarded scientists “cautiously optimistic” about a COVID vaccine, there seems to be a lot of eagerness regarding “getting back to normal.”

Normal defined by Oxford Languages means “conforming to a standard; usual, typical, or expected.”

Didn’t our past conformance to “usual, typical or expected” conduct cause the many inequities we are so clearly seeing unmasked by the pandemic? Do we really want to follow policies and legislation that are lacking in compassion towards the severely ostracized of society? Do we really want the poor to get poorer and the rich to get richer? Do we really want people living without healthcare or living with student loans they may never be able to repay in their lifetime?

If that is “normal,” I am not sure I want to go “back.”

A “new normal” makes no sense to me either because that implies bringing forward ideologies from the past that were less than ideal such as partisan politics, patriarchy, racial injustice, environmental ambivalence, systemic injustice, anti-Semitism, extremism, liberalism, and conservatism, just to name a few.

All of these “usual, typical or expected” behaviors have engendered worldwide cruelty, suffering, misery, and grief.

Oh, I know what you mean. I, too, want to gather with family and friends without worry and fear of spreading a highly contagious disease that could infect a loved one. The current state of hypervigilance is exhausting and the incredible trauma everyone is experiencing whether they realize it or not is overwhelming. A sense of ‘regularness’ would be a respite.

After thinking about my life prior to the pandemic and now, “normal” seems like an odd concept. Too much has changed.

Tears, which always flowed easily, fall in an ever-deepening consciousness of holiness for beloveds who are shunned because of the color of their skin, their sexual orientation, their religious beliefs, and/or their state of poverty. Having a voice, speaking out, taking a stand are all qualities that the Holy Spirit has honed during this experience. I feel more keenly mindful of life and its preciousness.

Why would I want to go back?

Plus, the whole notion of ‘going back’ is an illusion in the belief of time. The following poem by Hafiz says it best.

Now is the time to know
That all that you do is sacred.

Now, why not consider
A lasting truce with yourself and God.

Now is the time to understand
That all your ideas of right and wrong
Were just a child’s training wheels
To be laid aside
When you finally live
With veracity
And love.

Hafiz is a divine envoy
Whom the Beloved
Has written a holy message upon.

My dear, please tell me,
Why do you still
Throw sticks at your heart
And God?

What is it in that sweet voice inside
That incites you to fear?

Now is the time for the world to know
That every thought and action is sacred.

This is the time
For you to compute the impossibility
That there is anything
But Grace.

Now is the season to know
That everything you do
Is sacred.

No, ‘normal’ is not for me.