Dr. Laurie Archbald-Pannone, UVA associate professor of medicine: No. March 12, 2020 was the last day I ate indoors at a restaurant. At the time, there was mild apprehension – but much changed that week. The COVID-19 pandemic altered many aspects of “normalcy,” and for me eating inside at a restaurant is one of those activities.
(Commentary by Jennifer L. Lawless, Commonwealth Professor of Politics, and Mary Kate Cary, adjunct professor of politics and a senior fellow at the Miller Center) Worried that 2021 could be filled with cringe-worthy political conversations around the virtual dinner table and, post-pandemic, in real life? The two of us – one a card-carrying liberal and the other a self-avowed conservative – just survived 13 weeks of hour-long political conversations, twice a week every week. And get this: We actually enjoyed it.
On the morning of Dec. 16, the threat of a Virginia snowstorm canceled school for 7-year-old Alain Bell. He instead spent the morning scribbling a scowling face in black marker onto his father’s newly vaccinated upper arm. “It was his idea,” Alain said over Zoom, pointing to his father, Dr. Taison Bell, 37, a critical care physician at UVA Health in Charlottesville. “I feel good that he’s not going to get sick.”