Article: We Have to Grieve Our Last Good Days
Below is an excerpt from an article relevant to current times. A link to the full article can be found at the bottom.
[I was on a work trip in Florida in February, 2020, and] I felt like maybe I’d regret it [swimming in the ocean] if I didn’t go in. So I changed into a bathing suit I didn’t know I was wearing for the last time, and I swam out just far enough to feel free but still safe. Two things I haven’t felt since.
The water had a bite. I can still see the colors of the sunset if I close my eyes.
You have your own ocean, probably. The memory from Before that you can’t help returning to. The last concert you went to, the last hug you had with a distant loved one, the last trip you took to work maskless and unafraid. The last time you didn’t know it would be the last time.
These memories became a common topic of conversation and the object of a sort of hyper-nostalgia as huge swaths of people found themselves suddenly, indefinitely confined. Now that it’s been nearly a year since the pandemic officially became a pandemic, social media and our human tendency to mark anniversaries are conspiring to remind us anew of all the things we used to have just 12 months ago.
