I’m too pessimistic to participate in the kind of wishful “this is going to change the world” thinking that’s going on right now in left-wing and other progressive circles. If this pandemic is over within a few months, everything is going to roll back to just the way it was, and worse. The Donald will see to that.
Still it is fun to dream; I’ve been meaning to start writing some of these hopeful things down:
I’d like to see all those empty city streets covered with grass.
I like not seeing a plane in the sky and when there is one, thinking its on an important mission, delivering essential goods and saving lives.
I like that there are fewer cars and fewer accidents and virtually no highways deaths. (At the end of the day, the CoVid might save more lives than it takes.)
I like that the air is cleaner and the animals are coming out of the forest. This summer we might see the butterfies and bees surging back.
I like that advertising has no meaning right now. We don’t need it and maybe never did.
I don’t miss shopping. Malls are stupid. Curb-side pick up is awesome.
I like that I’m minding my pennies, or at least trying harder.
I’d like to see the end of cheap exotic travel, which has always been bourgeois and yet uncritically accepted by every kind of person.
I like that the supply chain is getting stripped down to essentials. If only we could keep it like that.
I like hearing from the PM and the Premier every single day. I like their sincerity and positive messages. Isn’t this what politicians are supposed to be like? Instead of carping finger wags or mean-spirited nogoodniks.
I like not seeing people and keeping my distance. (I’m an artist and that just kinda comes naturally; I actually feel kind of ‘understood’.)
I like cutting my own hair and then asking someone who has no experience to fix it.
I like that there’s a lot of thinking going on around aging and the vulnerable. Maybe we all don’t all need to self-isolate, just test a lot and figure out how to protect the vulnerable, paying them some really phenomenal attention and care, like elders deserve.
I’d like to see the government nationalize the banks. Those f_rs are unbelievable.
And the Basic Annual Income of course.
