Getting Out There, Post-COVID
If you follow me on social media, you know that I’ve been taking advantage of being vaccinated and the world starting to open back up again. Things are definitely different than pre-COVID but if we all roll with the rules and follow the guidelines, we’ll all be able to travel more.
And oh, how I have missed it!
In December, my family flew to Mexico for the holidays. I was really nervous about traveling, but we all wore shields and felt incredibly safe. The airlines sprayed our luggage with disinfectant and the hotel was at 50% capacity. And everyone there, tourists and residents alike, was really good about wearing masks.
In March, Lucy and I traveled to Florida for a volleyball tournament. By then I was fully vaccinated and the airplanes were fuller than in December. Florida has been known for relaxed restrictions and there were several conventions going on when we were there–so the hotel was pretty full. The hotel had mask requirements, but the players didn’t have to wear masks on the court.
A few weeks later, we traveled to California with Charlie to look at colleges. California has been on the opposite end of the spectrum from Florida. Restaurants were only at 25 percent occupancy and hotels didn’t have room cleaning or room service. But if you forgot something at home or needed extra towels, a robot delivered them–and that was pretty cool! We had to wear a mask while walking around outside, even when we were social distancing.
In Kansas City, our most recent volleyball trip, things were as expected: no food or drink service on the plane and hotels had mask rules. The girls had to play with their masks on and we wore our masks in our Ubers.
Overall, we’ve found traveling to be safe and organized and haven’t seen any blatant disregard for mask and social distancing rules.
Personally, I don’t love the masks. I’m ready to stop wearing them. But I am happy to follow the rules for the benefit of others.
Others haven’t been quite so agreeable. I’ve heard stories of patrons yelling at cashiers at stores about mask mandates. I’ve seen the videos of people throwing tantrums in stores. And a friend recently told me that the day after the Arizona governor lifted the mask mandate, about 80 percent of people at her gym worked out sans mask. And this was before vaccinations were widely available.
I’m really ready for things to go back to some sort of normalcy. Unfortunately, I think we have a long way to go before that happens. Let’s all stay safe and, most of all, courteous, as we start interacting with one another a bit more.
