Róisín Ingle: Why I can’t wait for the Great Unmasking

I can’t wait for Monday, February 28th. I’m calling it Unmaskmas. On Sunday February 27th, Unmaskmas Eve, I will gather up all the facemasks in the house and put them away out of sight. I know I will discover them in far flung corners and unexpected places. They are everywhere. Down the back of sofas. Discarded in dusty crevices. Incongruously cluttering up a child’s sock drawer. I won’t bin them or burn them or find ways to reuse them just yet. Not quite yet. But I will scoop them up and deposit them in a high cupboard, one I can’t reach without climbing on a chair.

I plan to celebrate Unmaskmas but I know there is still a way to go

I will gather every single one of the formerly fashionable facemasks, now so last season, and hide them away from my primary school-age children who have grown too attached to them for my liking.

Recently, I heard one of them say: “I like masks; people can’t see what you are really thinking” and my heart cracked a bit. I will hunt down every last one of them. The cloth ones, the disposable ones, the handmade designer ones featuring skulls which came in handy for Halloween. The sparkly, sequinned ones which jazzed up pandemic nights out.

I will wash and possibly iron and perhaps even frame my favourite one, a present from my mother. It features a brightly coloured illustration of the Poolbeg towers. That one will be my only pandemic souvenir. I do not plan to hold on to anything else that evokes this era, apart from maybe the cocktail-making set I bought to improve my margarita skills during lockdown. I will not be looking back or reeling in the pandemic years.

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I’m not delusional. I’ve read the case numbers. I’m glad facemasks will still be worn in healthcare settings and around more vulnerable people. Even before plague times that’s the way it always should have been. Some behaviours are changed forever. There are people who previously did not understand the importance of handwashing who have become hygiene experts. And where in the pre-pandemic era, some of us thought nothing of turning up to work with a cold, we’ll now be staying away from others when we have symptoms of illness. I plan to celebrate Unmaskmas but I know there is still a way to go. I’ve heard Taoiseach Micheál Martin and many others say it: “The pandemic is not over.” But the emergency phase is over. We are entering a more hopeful, transitional time which I intend to fully embrace.

In a few short days, in most settings, those scraps of cloth covering our lower faces, hiding our smiles and our frowns, will be optional, no longer mandatory. Hopefully now, it’s acceptable for those of us who hated them – I can’t be the only one – to admit that we hated them: The way they made your glasses steam up. The claustrophobic feeling if you wore one for too long. The lipstick stains that clung to the fabric. The palaver of having to remember to bring them with you everywhere. Were these minor, insignificant irritations compared to the big life and death pandemic stuff? Are these complaints the epitome of First World Pandemic Problems? Yes and yes. And still I don’t mind admitting I detested the things.

While some people will be slow to transition, I plan to have a very enjoyable Unmaskmas indeed. I will ditch the masks as enthusiastically as I adopted them. I was an early adopter. I was keen to wear masks back in April 2020 when senior health officials were telling us not to, insisting facemasks only led to “a false sense of security” and assuming that we, the dopey general public, couldn’t be trusted to wear them properly.

I was wearing them a couple of months later in June 2020 when we were told by senior government ministers that there was still no plan to make mask-wearing compulsory. By the time they were made compulsory, most people were already wearing masks, the public proving once again to be ahead of the curve as we were last year with antigen testing. And having been good citizens by doing the right thing even before we were told what it was by the higher-ups, I think we have earned our freedoms.

I won't be judging anybody for their facemask choices. I hope I won't be judged for mine either

I suppose now is a good time to think about how to reuse the masks. I’ve heard a few suggestions. They’d make good banana holders, for the kind of person who needs a handbag for their bananas. As the weather improves, the very brave could turn them into bikinis or even mankinis. Some pessimists will of course want to hold on to them “for the next pandemic”. Museums will collect and preserve them for the inevitable Covid exhibitions 100 years from now. Some people will continue wearing them, especially the more vulnerable and the more cautious.  In reality, I’ll probably keep a couple handy to wear in very crowded places and on public transport – it’s impossible to ignore the fact that six national groups representing medically vulnerable people are seriously concerned about the ending of mandatory mask wearing. Others will continue wearing them because two-year habits die hard and their faces will feel too naked in public. In this transitional time, I won’t be judging anybody for their facemask choices. I hope I won’t be judged for mine either.

Next Monday, following the latest Government and medical advice, I’ll be celebrating a significant ending and a hopeful beginning. Merry Unmaskmas everyone.