We've set a date to eat supper outside with friends since some of the rules are relaxing in June. I miss entertaining. I miss making suppers and desserts. At the same time, the isolation enforced earlier this year was not particularly hard on the introverted family that we are. Now when I think of entertaining, I think about how little time I have since the children are home and my mornings are given over to their school work and routines. I almost envy extroverted neighbours who gather often, six feet apart, invigorated by the exchanges while I cast around for more quiet. They love meeting while I wonder where I would find the time to do it. I worry I might come out of this pandemic more feral since the calendar has no longer forced the practice of the traditions that brought us together: birthdays, Easter, long weekends.

I’ve realized over time that, as Heidi Julavits writes, “It's hard to make new friends at this stage of life (...). I always want new friends, but I know what it takes to make a good one. It takes years, decades, and back when I was younger I had hours and hours of those days of those years of those decades to dedicate to getting to know a friend. Now I have minutes of hours of days of years of decades. To acquire a new friend under these time restrictions would require three consecutive lives.”

While social distancing threatens to cover our social etiquette with a thin mossy film, the opposite is also true. This pandemic has provided the greatest conversational shortcut ever. All you have to say is, “This is crazy! How have you been?”