Editorial: Our new normal

Imagine this: You’re dressed and ready to attend your first class of the day, but can’t help but feel like you’re forgetting something. Disregarding this, you walk out your front door, down some steps and across campus when you notice something different—there’s a light breeze reaching the bottom half of your face. 

Then it hits you. You forgot your mask and have to walk all the way back to retrieve it. Sigh.

Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, just shy of two years ago, almost everyone has experienced a similar scenario at least once.

Wearing a mask has become a part of our daily routine and is an essential part of our lives at Lehigh, especially as students interact face-to-face with a multitude of professors and peers all day.

However, with the Omicron wave finally subsiding and the number of vaccinated individuals increasing, over the course of this month, multiple states across the country have begun to draw back their mask mandates, including California, Connecticut, Delaware, New Jersey, Oregon, Illinois, New York and Rhode Island.

With so many Northeastern states toning down mask mandates, Pennsylvania may be next. What does that mean for Lehigh?

Two years into the pandemic, it’s hard to picture a reality in which masks are not required. Can our lives finally return to normalcy? Will we ever be able to feel fully comfortable without a mask? It’s hard to tell.

Thinking back on how the U.S. reacted to the 9/11 terrorist attacks close to 21 years ago, the nation’s “normal” evolved into something entirely different. Heightened security became a new way of life.

Today, our “normal” faces a similar conundrum. We live in an entirely different world than the one before March 2020. Will we continue to wear masks when we feel sick around others, even if it’s just a cold? Will we have to get a COVID-19 vaccine every year, similar to the flu? In what, less predictable, ways will our lives be different?

Even Lehigh has begun to ease restrictions, first revoking the 25-person indoor gathering limit and now, most notably, transitioning certain areas in the libraries to being mask-optional in an effort to accommodate both people who wish to remain in a masked environment and those who are comfortable otherwise.

These changes are no surprise to students when there are countless restaurants and shops around Bethlehem no longer requiring masks to be worn indoors—sure, every student wears a mask in the classroom, but just blocks away, at Saxbys, few masks are in sight. 

Then the weekend comes around and masks are even rarer, close to non-existent—bars and restaurants are packed with college students. 

While we wear our masks in the classroom, they typically come off the moment we step outside. With this in mind, it is likely that  Lehigh will follow the lead of other universities as they choose to end their mask mandates. How soon will this come to be? Is it premature? Are we ready for this?

Besides a doctor’s office perhaps, schools are one of the few places still requiring masks. Would it really be such a huge shock to us if Lehigh’s campus-wide mask mandate came to an end when Lehigh facilities are becoming more lenient and many have already ended their use of masks most everywhere else?

Well…for many people, the idea of ending the school’s mask mandate is a dream come true. Others couldn’t care less. But for some, this new reality is extremely daunting.

While not everyone may agree with the ethics behind this de-masking timeline, we believe that each and every one of us can agree that this pandemic has exacerbated the differences between those who are healthy and those who are immunocompromised. 

It’d be easy for most students to just stop wearing masks. For others who are older, or are more susceptible to health problems, these new measures may seem overeager. 

Realistically, life isn’t going to be the same as it once was. So, as we re-evaluate and begin navigating our return to normal, let’s recognize these differences and do what we feel comfortable doing, keeping each other in mind.