Stay 6' Apart

Yesterday, while on a jog, I noticed this painted marker on the path. The once-bright blue color had faded after six years in the Colorado sunshine. The edges had cracked and chipped away after six years of foot and bike traffic. But it was still clearly recognizable.

STAY 6’ APART.

These markers used to be everywhere during the pandemic years. Cautions against closeness in a time of contagion.

I often think about how my kids will one day amaze their own kids and grandkids with stories of when the world shut down. A time when we gathered outside on streets instead of inside homes. We wore masks and prayed for a vaccine. School classrooms turned online. And we had nothing but free time in our calendars.

It was a time of fear and uncertainty and devastating loss. But it was also a time of simplicity and reconnection and creativity.

In many ways, it seems like another lifetime. But it wasn’t another lifetime, it was ours. And so many Covid changes have become permanent fixtures that it often feels like we are still in it.

When I saw this weathered paint marker on the path, it took me right back to those days when we needed warnings because everything was just so fraught and fragile.

Six years later, we’ve loosened the restrictions and regained most semblances of normalcy, whatever that means.

But the imprints last. Like all significant experiences in our lives.

Time and traffic chip away at the edges of the memories, but they’re still there. They might have lost their vibrant colors, but they’re still recognizable.

At one point, that marker served a specific purpose: to remind people to keep their distance to lower their risk of infection. When there was no longer an imminent need for that caution, we no longer needed the reminder.

Someone probably should have removed that sign from the path. But no one did, and it’s still there, slowly fading away. One day it will be gone.

But until that day comes, I’ll appreciate the marker as a universal vestige of a not-so-long-ago past that forever changed the world, and each of us.

Like this object-based story telling? My memoir, Piece by Piece: A Life Remembered through Things Lost, is available here. 📖💙