The New World
What we once conformed to as the norm, now takes a different shape…
Just three years ago, in the year of 2019, we all enjoyed a prolific year full of success. We had a surplus of raw materials on the manufacturing spectrum and were producing at a rapid pace. When we went to the grocery store, there was discount after discount due to a surplus of food and the need to dispose of food soon as soon as possible. Or maybe it was time to replace the sofa or the chair in the living room, and you were able to have a new one by the end of the same day.
Yes indeed, we had gotten used to being able to do virtually anything at virtually any moment. It was all such a perfect world, and we could see all different parts of it as well. There wasn’t a single limit to anything, and people were so much happier. But in just a matter of months, our world has entirely changed and to this day, has remained the exact same.
The year 2020 was truly one for the books and marked the end of the peaceful and prolific era of the prior year. For the first three months, everything still remained the same for us here in America, but the uneasiness was quickly growing. There were reports of the new coronavirus spreading to all parts of the globe, and quickly at that. But we kept going on with our lives, going to work, spending time with our friends and family, and then it all began to change.
Around the end of March, everyone went home to work remotely due to concerns of the pandemic. We were all unsure of what to think of the virus, and with a history of plague and pox to humanity, we didn’t want to bear the worst of it. Only our essential workers in hospitals and other healthcare facilities continued to go to work in person. Everyone else was restricted, and curfews were put in place for some parts of the country.
It was quite a change, but we started to learn more about the virus. In spite of our concerns, to some of us it was a relief to know that it was not nearly comparable to the bubonic plague, smallpox, or even the early flu. Instead, for most folks, it induced simple flu and cold symptoms for people. Yet the pandemic began to make things worse for us outside of the health aspects, and we quickly saw the aftermath in an economic form.
Before we knew it, there was nothing on the shelves in our local grocery stores, and it was possible to go hungry in a first-world country. There was the implementation of mask mandates, and many restaurants and other social areas were closed down. Then, with everyone at home, the airports began to lose business with no one traveling, and soon after the worst followed.
With the economy in disdain, there was no longer the funds to afford the positions of millions of Americans. Many individuals suffered the loss of their jobs amidst the pandemic and were laid off in the thousands. Eventually, many companies became so short on funds they couldn’t even lay their employees off anymore. Instead, they started furloughing them, thus pushing them to quit on their own, and avoiding the need to pay them a severance package.
It was so sad to see the country and the world, go from a happy and fully functional 2019, to a fragmented 2020. It was just so surreal for the year, and I never thought that such an inconvenience would occur in our modern world. I just thought that we were so much more advanced than this, and that this would blow over like a simply cold spreading at work. But instead, the pandemic tightened its grip even more, and completely changed the world.
And yet here we are two years later, still stuck in the same exact situation with not a single improvement. Even though we have a vaccine, we are told that it is still unsafe to go out. So, there are still not a lot of people that are working and keeping the economy stimulated for production. As such, there is now a second problem we face due to the pandemic.
The supply chain shortage is among one of the worst problems we have faced in a long time. You can’t buy everything that you need at a grocery store because it’s no longer there. You can’t buy furniture at a store for your house because it’s no longer there. Even if you want to buy a house or a car, it’s probably not there either and at this rate, it’s all going to get even worse.
Poor leadership continues, and we still have some people that are unfortunate enough to have not worked since the beginning of this pandemic. And with such a long-term consequence, we are now turning these economic issues into permanent downfalls. Now the world is facing severe inflation, and the cost of goods and other materials has gone through the roof. By threatening people’s jobs with mask mandates and lay-offs, there are even less jobs being worked.
And so, the inflation only grows, and those that are still working keep their pre-pandemic wages. It has become difficult now, just to simply survive with the current environment. We have a new world that we live in, and the one that we once knew is now our past. But that doesn’t mean that things are permanently bleak.
Think of this new world as the steep and seemingly endless summit of a mountain. There are many challenges that you may face if you decide to climb it. You may slip on a rock or two while trying to scale it and may even injure yourself. You could even fall, and even without injury, you suffer the consequence of having to start your climb all over. And when you finally look past all of the mountain's challenges to you, then comes other factors.
For one, there are the dangerous animals that also reside around you on the mountain. Then, it likely will get extremely cold, and horrible weather conditions become the next occurrence. There’s just a negative after a negative in the tough process of your climb. But then everything changes when you finally reach the peak, and you realize that everything will get better.
You see the glimmering hope of the sun on the other side of the peak, and you feel its warmth heating you up after days of miserable cold. It’s the most amazing and worthwhile change for you, and you’re glad you endured the long and arduous expedition. Well, this world we live in right now, is that very mountain, and we as a species are actively climbing it. But the world won’t be like this forever, and the change we desire is coming soon. When we reach the top, we will rejoice together, and get our world back to that which it was in 2019, or maybe even better.
