Dear Reader,

I’ve never kept a diary or a journal. There are times I wish I had, as when I was writing my book. Details of conversations and feelings, recorded in real time, might have enriched the narratives of cases and decision-making I describe. A bit more verisimilitude I would have liked. We have a tendency to forget, especially, how fearful, uncertain, or worried we were as events unfolded.

It occurs to me, though, that I do have a journal of sorts. It’s these notes. They are, to be sure, intermittent and public, but from time to time I set down personal thoughts about my reaction to the world around me. And looking back on those reflections months or years later is illuminating.

What’s on my mind lately is our collective emergence from the long pandemic lockdown. I’m rejoicing, like everyone else. But I also find it jarring. There is occasionally a cognitive dissonance between how we have been conditioned for 15 months and what now makes scientific sense. I went back to the CAFE note I wrote back on March 12, 2020, when the country seemed to shut down overnight. I wrote about the jolts to our daily lives: