We could all learn from what you have doubtlessly been through in the last five years. Bravo for maintaining a positive outlook in the face of your own health issues. You’ve pretty much illustrated that not everyone is strong enough to do the same when faced with just the pandemic, let alone a threatening disease.

I have a lot of thoughts… in no particular order:
1) The logic of the anti- maskers is hypocritical. The anti-maskers resent being told what to do by the health authorities. Yet the anti-maskers *demand* that they have the right to tell *you* what to do. Try not to let these unintelligent people ruffle your feathers or ruin your mood. Put your own safety and boundaries first in a pandemic.
2) While all the COVID modeling is helpful, the one thing that can’t be measured or predicted has been humans reaction to stress. I agree that it does seem as if people have lost their minds. In my banal daily outings, I’ve seen people screaming on the Skytrain or in their cars alone. I’ve been followed by men either on foot or on bike (I am not wearing sexy clothes just so you know). My own friends faces look sad and that spark that was once there is gone, temporarily I hope. We’re all under a lot of stress and we all react in different ways. It’s a lot to deal with day, day out.
3) Animal populations get wiped out by disease. This is how I view the pandemic as well.
4) Contributing good things still makes for a better community. A garden is only going to grow if it’s tended to. Otherwise it dies.

Humanity is being preyed on by Cyborgs. Sounds silly but it’s true.

People that don't believe the virus is real, or the need to wear masks, or have the gall to block traffic to hospitals or terrorize children and teachers at schools and freak out on staff in stores are a bunch of babies. (Sorry, didn't mean to insult babies.) Misplaced and ignorant rage. Put it to better use and help out a food bank or volunteer at an animal shelter something, ANYTHING more productive. No credibility with their faux cause. Are they potentially another Darwin's Award candidate? Losers!

Things remain exactly as they always were, pre-post pandemic. No new normal. More divisiveness, more finger pointing, more aggression, more control without changing the behaviour. Same boat maybe, some in yachts, some in inflatable rafts.

I personally don't care whether people wear masks, get vaccinated, makes no difference to me. Nothing will change either way. People will keep getting sick and die. From someone who's battled devastating illnesses with little to no support from these grade F systems, I've come to understand there's more to peoples' decision than being "anti" this or that. Buzz word concepts that get applied to absolutely everything reduce complex issues to a single word, they minimize the history people have with trauma and attempt to dismiss via judgment rather than those institutions looking at the fundamental problem and how they've benefitted from their failures.

I wonder how many of those people were dehumanized, traumatized, generally abandoned by medical institutions, people who needed help that they turned away and now those insties refusing to look at themselves as part of the problem expect to turn around and punch down to lay the blame at their feet. Controlling govt health directives, mandatory masks vax, isn't going to cut it and certainly doesn't help their cause. They're as untrustworthy and failing in their role as they ever were to people who have never received the bare minimum from them.