Reflections on a Pandemic Winter
Even as spring arrives (at last!), I’ve been reflecting on this past winter. Just the word itself brings up dreaded images of snow, bitter cold, mittens, scarves, knit hats. For lack of a better phrase—winter blows. Give me a scorching hot summer afternoon in July any day of the week instead of a frigid NYC afternoon in January. And to add serious insult to injury, recent winters have brought along their ‘friend,’ COVID. This past year, it was Omicron.
Omicron. COVID. Rapid test. PCR. Fully vaccinated. Booster. Breakthrough infections. UGH. All these words are now part of our daily vernacular. Some words we knew before but now they have a completely different meaning. As we settled in for a third winter battling this pandemic, many of us were still struggling. Maybe still are, even as winter gives way to spring.
If you were in NYC this past December and through the holidays, it felt eerily similar to the lockdown. I mean a JV version of the lockdown that began in March 2020, but a lockdown still. Good Morning America reported that one in 60 people in NYC was testing positive the week of December 27. (Sobering, given that USAfacts.org was reporting that in New York state, 72 percent of those eligible were fully vaccinated and 86 percent had received one dose.)
Every time you turned a corner you were greeted with never-ending lines outside testing sites like CityMD. People getting tested as they wanted to travel to see family for Christmas. Many had to wait in those same hours-long lines upon their return in order to go back to work.
Should things like air travel even require vaccinations? I say, HELL YEAH. Planes, trains, cruises, you name it—I say fully vaccinated people only. Folks absolutely can choose not to get vaccinated. But if they don’t, then they should not get to participate in public events, thereby endangering those who did get vaccinated and boosted. Vaccines save lives.
Honestly, I was somewhat surprised when I arrived in Rehoboth last July to spend the summer. Our first night out I was looking for my vaccination card. Housemates, perplexed, were like, “what are you doing?” After filling them in, the common response was “Yeah, this ain’t New York City.”
Speaking of NYC—numerous restaurants and bars temporarily closed in the days and week around Christmas and New Year’s, due to lack of staff. Dozens of Broadway performances were canceled; some, just hours before the curtain was to rise. A few shows, including Waitress and Jagged Little Pill, closed permanently. With a lack of available crew members, the famous phrase was nullified: the show actually could NOT go on. The very popular monthly queer party, Battle Hymn, canceled their December event. Holiday parties were postponed left and right.
The weekend of January 8 saw my plans disappear as one by one friends tested positive for COVID. All fully vaccinated. All asymptomatic. Two of those went out club-hopping New Year’s weekend, so their results did not come as a huge shock. Bye-bye Drag Race viewing party, bottomless brunch, and movie night. I felt like I was quarantining, too!
In present-day NYC, life is happily returning to the “new normal” we are living with. The Music Man, with Tony award winners Hugh Jackman and Sutton Foster, is THE show to see this season, selling out nightly. Harry Potter and the Cursed Child plays to packed houses, even with its three-and-a-half-hour run time. Dollar Tree shelves are full again. Battle Hymn is back to holding their monthly party, drawing a sold-out crowd. Five thousand vacationers recently set sail on the Atlantis Cruise.
You can’t see it or touch it, but you can feel it. There is a change in the atmosphere. The air is easier to breathe, the sun is shining a little brighter. The mood is optimistic and hopeful.
We will get through this pandemic and we will prevail. The queer community has been through an epidemic before. One more winter done; one more spring now here to enjoy. And summer looming—c’mon, July! ▼
Robert Dominic splits his time between Brooklyn and Rehoboth Beach. He writes for publications including Instinct Magazine and his own blog, The Gays of Our Lives.