‘Our first meal out for more than a year was pizza – and it was brilliant’

It this the new normal? Is it even close to what the new normal will be?

We liked to eat out occasionally before the pandemic struck and it all stopped.

It had been 18 months or so since we last graced a restaurant or café in Dublin. And as they days went past, the dreams of that first big night out grew and grew.

I began imagining that we would splash out and eat in a place with at least one Michelin Star and wash down the food with a nice bottle of Domaine Leroy Latricieres-Chambertin Grand Cru 2001*.

It was nothing like that.

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Our first meal out in Dublin for more than a year was pizza on Grand Canal Quay, washed down with a bottle of something-or-other.

And it was brilliant. It was just great to be able to sit down in the company of nearby strangers and have our food served to us on a lovely evening in one of our favourite spots in Dublin.

We are, it seems, moving closer and closer towards the “new normal”, that is to say what will eventually become normal once this pandemic has passed.

Or maybe I should say if this pandemic passes.

One day a country, such as Australia, is praised for the way it handled Covid, and the next it is criticised by all and sundry for failing to vaccinate its population, lying 35th of the 38 countries in the OECD in that regard.

Some Australian cities are enduring yet another lockdown – and that doesn’t just mean wearing masks and social distancing. It means police helicopters patrolling the streets from above, urging people to get off the streets.

We see 40,000 in Croke Park, 10,000 at gigs in the North despite its figures being worse than ours. But here we are, at least, eating out again. We are sitting in pubs sipping pints again.

So. It this the new normal? Is it even close to what the new normal will be?

The answer, I’m afraid, is yes and no.

Because the likelihood is there will be several new normals.

The younger in our society will, in the main, pile into gigs and pubs and clubs as soon as they’re let and it’s hard to blame them. Certainly, for the sake of our musicians, their sound operators, the staff in the venues they play, it will be great to see them packed again.

Did we ever think, when we read those first stories of a virus caused by a wild animal at a market in a Chinese city, that two years on, it would still dominate our lives?

Hopefully, that will also be true of our pubs, our great pubs like Toners where sitting at the bar is part and parcel of the experience, at least it is if you’re beaten to a place in the snug.

And hopefully it’s true for sport – those who run our sports organisations know that survival is now on the edge of a blade after so long without the packed houses they had become used to.

But that new normal won’t be normal for everyone.

It won’t be normal for many of the older generation who will still fear what will, hopefully, just be the remnants of the pandemic.

And it won’t be normal for me and my ilk, the medically vulnerable, who are unlikely to want to spend several hours pressed up against strangers, be it at a gig or a match or in a pub.

That’s what I think lies ahead.

Not so much new normal, as different normals.

Hopefully, many or most will return to a normal like that which we had up to the start of 2020 – with the added bonus of a greater awareness of personal hygiene.

Others though, will have to adjust their normal to ensure continued safety and keep their distance from a virus which doesn’t look like it’s going to go away completely any time soon.

Did we ever think, when we read those first stories of a virus caused by a wild animal at a market in a Chinese city, that two years on, it would still dominate our lives? Most probably had to look up Wuhan and pangolin to find out where and what they were talking about.

Did we ever realise how wonderful our “normal” back then actually was?

We seem to be getting there.

But whether it’s new normal 1, 2 or 3 that you’ll be getting is still in the lap of the gods.

My money is on all three depending on your age, state of health and confidence.

Which means normal for me will be nothing like normal at all.

* I have to confess I have never heard of this wine and just looked up a website to find the name of something expensive to show off. The legendary TP Whelehan once told me that the best wine in the world is the wine you like best and if it’s cheap, you’re lucky. And I’m lucky!