…it’s over.

After two years of self-isolating, hand-sanitizing, mask-wearing, stuffing cotton swaps up our noses, and struggling to suppress a cough in public for fear of sending everyone in a 50-foot radius scrambling for the hills in a blind panic, our Government has decreed that, on Thursday the 24th of February 2022—two years after it began—COVID shall cease to exist. (Or, if you’re reading this on a later date, that was the date it stopped, and you are now living with the fallout. How’s it going?)

But really, it’s about time, isn’t it? We’ve put up with forced solitary confinement, crowd avoidance, getting shots (or avoiding them, if that’s your thing) for twenty-four months now and COVID, like a rude dinner guest, shows no sign of moving on. We’ve dropped hints, turned down the lights, even started clearing up the living room, but COVID continues to sit there, drinking our whiskey and eating our canapes, totally oblivious to our discomfort and desire to be left alone, so it’s time we stop thinking of how to move it on and start planning a strategy for living with it.

Granted, the announcement was a bit abrupt and the timing a little dodgy, but even skeptical scientists and cautious virologists are beginning to grudgingly admit that, “Yeah, this is as good a time as any and, if we don’t do it now, when will we?”

I side with the cautious, but I am pleased to see the Government handing our Right to Roam back to us, even if the reasons aren’t entirely altruistic.

Nice as it is going to feel to be let off the leash, you can bet that if Boris hadn’t embroiled himself in #partygate, and #wallpapergate and #jimmysavilegate and whatever other self-inflicted #gate has erupted in the meantime, we’d be wearing masks well into the summer months. As it is, this premature erasing of COVID has won back enough support for Boris to avoid a leadership challenge and to, once again, allow Boris (as has been the case throughout his entire pampered and entitled life) to get away with his transgressions by making other people pay for them.

Even the most enthusiastic supporters of End COVID Day admit that more people are going to die than normally would have if we had remained vigilant. So, if you are one of those unfortunates who ends up dying of COVID, but who—under a more cautious and responsible Government—would have gone on to a longer and (one must suppose) happier existence, you can take pride in the fact that you gave your life so Boris could enjoy a few more months in Number 10. Well done you! Where should we send the flowers?

Free or not, as with the much ballyhooed—and then largely ignored—Freedom Day in June July 2021, people are still allowed to wear a mask, wash their hands and keep their distance, and—as we did then—my wife and I plan on continuing to do so into the foreseeable future.

I want to be optimistic, and I do hope our End of COVID Day (or, as absolutely no one is calling it, Freedom Day 2.0) goes swimmingly, but I do recall a rather fraught time after Freedom Day 1.0, and the return to sanctions in a few months’ time. So, pardon me if I don’t immediately join in with any Mask-Burning parties.

Keep well, everyone. Really, I mean that.