and then we have the mandates. presumably, your behavior is the same with v.s. without them. as is the case for most people i know. with the exception of my one friend who was building a japanese-style coin-operated 24/7 unstaffed arcade business in a stripmall off aurora. she ditched that a year into the pandemic because navigating the mandates as a business owner is not easy (how does one check vax cards at the door if their business only works because it’s unstaffed? once she does find a solution, how long until the next mandate changes things for her again? it’s settled down a little, but the policy changes were really chaotic through to last summer).
“return to normal” as a phrase is a bit ambiguous. does it mean everyone goes back to living how they did two years ago? or does it mean everyone, within each area of their life, has the option to return to what worked for them then, while keeping the parts of their current lifestyle they prefer? obviously, we can’t grant that level of optionality to every area of life without bifurcating society (e.g. separate schools for in-person vs virtual), which doesn’t sound great. but we can grant that optionality in lots of areas of life that are already adept at catering to different preferences — e.g. restaurants (if you want italian food, go to an italian restaurant), entertainment venues, gyms, and really most small/medium businesses.
i’d love for my friend to be able to open her arcade some day, and i know there are hundreds of other individuals in a similar position as hers trying to bring new things into our community. i think it’s reasonable that we allow a “return to normal” in the areas of life that are already adept at catering to different preferences, and leave the mandates only for those areas in which there’s less optionality (e.g. public transit, schools — for now, etc).