Mask Away

Lets face it. Ever since covid began and masks became required there fore an important essential part of our every day must have with us wherever we go or we can not get in. The need for making them a fashion statement has as well. From neon colored, glittery masks, to the cutest pictures and designs trending and becoming more popular for a majority of people. All the while over half of the masks produced, unfortunately, have already become public waste somewhere and from a half of that are in nature somewhere polluting the ground and earth.

As much as the cute masks make it worth it as much as it can for some people, I, like many others, just wear a simple one. Whether it is my black one, or my breast cancer awareness butterfly hope and love one, or my disposable one. By the end of 2021 I wanna see that these masks finally made their good riddance in the fashion trends, and in the world. I can admit it will be strange when that day finally comes now that they have become something that everyone has become so accustomed to wearing them and having at least one accessible with them at every single place they go that requires them by law.

Because once this fashion trend has gone out of style, it is goodbye COVID for good! Although many people have not made it trendy in their everyday lives and for the ones that do we can hold on to them as a reminder of a time where we were better off. Time ticks slowly on the COVID clock with the different variants, travel restrictions being discussed at play, and the vaccine making its way out the door and into peoples bodies. Every single day for me having a mask has become too important. Like as necessary as a pair of shoes, but inconvenient, uncomfortable, and just another piddly thing that needs managing.

We can all admit it that for the majority of people it has become an annoyance. Another quick and easy way money maker for some people. One intended for our well being and our safety, but one that we can't wait until we aren't consumed by the constant need for one at any moment in our day. Looking around when we can't find it, stuck without being able of getting in some places without one, having to get another one when we lose it, and whatever little inconvenience that comes along with having to always keep one of these safety precautions handy at all times. They've become a pain regardless of how cute they might have become as a trending fashion statement, and seeing someones thinking oh I wish I had a mask that cute!

All the while, resources are being thrown away on them for them just to become part of the giant land masses of garbage and waste being put on this planet, and sadly enough a handful of the people who have dedicated themselves and making sure they have their masks on each and every time they are required to do so, have still managed to get covid. Not leaving them to be rendered as completely useless unless being the one who still got it despite taking the necessary precautions including having on a mask.

Although they have become a relentless need in our society for every single individual required to wear one, they have also managed to make themselves for a large variety of people, something to make a fashion statement of, and become trendy. A big fashion statement for people who make their material masks be made of big named designer brands, and even more so for the people who make and sell them. What is the cutest mask that will sell? When honestly, this whole COVID thing is getting old, and the masks are too.

When we can say goodbye to these things that started becoming a fashion statement, we can start seeing the world return to its normal state of being. Seeing peoples real faces again, and not having to always need a mask at hand will be a huge relief lifted off many peoples shoulders. Even though there will still be billions more masks in circulation for being disposed of than there are people in the world, there will be something that will be so blissful and carefree being able to walk outside the door without needing to have one in our pockets, backpacks, purses, bags, and where ever else everybody keeps one on hand at all times.

We can hang them on our walls as souvenirs if we want, a momentum for when there was a time we all needed healing from. A memory of something that we got through together, and a keepsake for how far we made it past something that has been dragging on since 2019. For some people they will still wear their bandana, and the patterned masks at raves, burlesque face masks and whatever kind of play mask for Halloween, but it wont be a necessity for every day living. It will be back to the way that it was before COVID. This will be a time of growth, a time of remembering what we all endured as communities, states, nations, and countries.

Our faces will be free from the masks, the no masks no entry signs will be down from the doors, everything will be open at maximum capacity, and the world will no longer be living in a pandemic state.