While the whole world has experienced this pandemic, there is an incredible variety of pandemic experiences out there. Within the United States there are so many variables between states, counties, cities, school districts, and families. A common feature of COVID debate I have noticed is that it often seems like people are not even talking about the same thing.

I live in a state that has had a fairly restrictive approach to COVID - my kids were in remote learning for about a year and we had two periods which could arguably be called "shut downs." But our fortunate circumstances made it so that I do not feel like it was particularly difficult for our children. As a result I have not reacted very strongly to local authorities continuing very cautious policies regarding masks and cohorting in schools. I was initially perplexed by the very strong reactions against the same among my peers, but am coming to understand that, like what this article points out, it has been very difficult for other children.