Entrenched

Mango trench
Sezane tank
Sezane jeans
Zara sandals (similar)
Friday by JW Pei handbag (similar)
Celine sunglasses
Linjer rings (c/o) (similar)
Maris Pearl Co. earrings (c/o) (similar)
Location: The Exchange District – Winnipeg, Manitoba

I can’t resist a good pun, so I couldn’t miss the opportunity to call a post featuring a trench coat Entrenched. But the idea of being entrenched is one that’s been on my mind lately. Today marks four months since quarantine began in Manitoba. Since that time, most businesses have reopened in some capacity. I’ve been able to get my hair and nails done. Last weekend, I sat on a restaurant patio. This weekend, I met a friend outdoors for a picnic. But life is far from normal. And as time continues to pass, I find myself becoming increasingly entrenched in a new routine based on public health protocols. Some days, it’s hard to remember what my life used to look like.

…but it’s only been four months. And that’s what really baffles me; how quickly and easily we can adjust. All it took, truly, was a couple of uncomfortable weeks of adaptation. After that, it was just normal to only see people on video. I almost immediately forgot why I ever thought going to the grocery store multiple times a week was a good use of my (often limited) time. My new routine is firmly now established, and I am, truly, entrenched in it.

And yet, I snap back almost instantly. That’s what makes it this experience so fascinating. I feel entrenched in my new way of being, but when I do something that was once normal for the first time, I can almost immediately forget that anything ever changed. I give hugs, I touch door knobs and table tops indiscriminately, and I even (although I am loathe to admit it) find myself wondering, at times, if that really matters.

The fact is, I know that some habits picked up in this pandemic, which I acknowledge is far from over, will stay with me in the long term. After all, this isn’t the first pandemic I’ve lived through. Since the H1N1 flu in 2009 (and 2010), I’ve used mouthwash twice a day every day. (Public health officials at the time recommended it as a way of killing germs that might have entered your respiratory system but not yet caused in fection.) I suspect after this, I will never stop sanitizing my hands immediately every time I arrive home or leave somewhere else. But my moments of slight irresponsibility leave me feeling encouraged.

It sounds crazy, but it’s true. I’ve worried, at times in the past four months, about how entrenched in my new habits I am, and how I will manage to readjust to normalcy when the pandemic eventually does end. Because I don’t feel normal, I’ve wondered if I will still know how to be normal when the time comes that we can be. If I will be able to allow myself to be, after facing so much anxiety about the dangers of our normal way of living. Every new phase of reopening brings uncertainty. But each time, I’ve faced it. And when I reflect on the past weeks, I realise I am already doing the things I’ve wondered if I’ll be able to do – because no matter how entrenched I get in one way of living, I adjust to new circumstances. We all do.

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