Why do we have to make it so hard on ourselves? Wear a mask, keep your distance, and keep your cool.

By Dennis Archambault

It’s frustrating when you return to your favorite restaurant, closed during the crisis phases of the pandemic, and the server isn’t wearing a mask. It’s also frustrating to read about another favorite restaurant that is struggling to do the right thing enforcing the public health directive of masking and physical distancing, or yet another that has had to close because of angry, abusive customers refusing to mask (https://www.freep.com/story/news/local/michigan/2020/06/29/restaurant-closes-dining-room-says-angry-customers-not-worth/3280869001/?utm_source=native&utm_medium=capi_retrofit&utm_content=inapp&build=native-web_i_p) And, if the economics aren’t tough enough, there’s the safety of the restaurant workers and their livelihoods. Of course, it’s frustrating to know that bars and entertainment venues are proving to be cultures for the contagion, has clusters of young adults catch up on lost social time this summer.

While restaurants and entertainment venues offer a social outlet during normal times – even artistic/cultural experience, if you view fine cuisine as such, during less stressful times are that much more valuable, not to mention a major segment of the struggling economy. So, when Mayor Duggan threatens to close bars and restaurants that don’t comply with the public health regulations, he’s also facing an economic risk.

Overall, the restaurant industry has been supportive, if frustrated, by this experience (https://www.freep.com/story/news/local/michigan/2020/06/26/michigan-restaurants-masks-social-distancing-coronavirus/3250408001/?utm_term=upNextModule). But it would be much easier for everyone to put leave their politics at home and abide by a reasonable regulation that is in everyone’s best interest. Easier said than done.

Plenty of frustration to go around in the re-entry to social life. On one level, it’s such a simple adjustment: learn to tolerate a face mask and its visual barriers and learn to keep a physical distance from people – for a very good reason: preventing the spread of a potentially deadly virus. On the positive side, tolerating these social inconveniences allow businesses to function, the economy to revive, and life to go on until a vaccine is created.

Dennis Archambault is vice president of Public Affairs for Authority Health