We went on a walk today, it was so quiet.

We went on a walk today, and there were no cars.

We went on a walk today, and I heard so many sounds.

Birds, high pitch, low pitch.

We went on a walk today, and I showed my daughter flowers.

I feel uncomfortable. Sitting here, we’ll get to a point where we move forward, but what does normal look like? What is the impact this social isolation period will have on the average person in America?

How do we fix the problems the we have seen laid bare? Healthcare, gross health disparity, workers that are paid so little to do something so vital.

The disparity. 72% of people who died in Chicago due to COVID-19 are black. The impact of structural racism runs deep.

I don’t want to go back to the old normal, I want to create a new normal. I want to sit in this awareness and discomfort, and not forget it. Harness the discomfort, the sadness, the loss, as energy for change.

I’m so lucky to be in an area where we had a public health official who shut our area down, and called for social isolation. The lives she saved — countless. But why did others not look at the same data and draw the same conclusions? I just scroll through Twitter and the news and see illness, deaths, and colleagues at a distance suffering.

I don’t want things to go back to the old normal, that felt like a lie. I want it to be better.