COVID Has Really Messed With Our Senses
A Commentary and A Proposal
December 13, 2021
As people who lived through 2020, we have all been having to wear masks for a really long time. One would think that we would have a pretty good handle on them.
But no, that would make too much sense.
Whenever my mask inevitably muffles my voice I’m commonly met by someone pulling down their mask to hear me better. It makes sense really. They are just trying to get rid of the noise dampening fabric that prevents the sound from being able to bounce off their face to properly complete its 112-degree turn to enter the eardrum. Obviously.
Maybe it’s miscalculated muscle memory. A misfire from the ears to the brain that’s derived from our instinct when we can’t hear. Or maybe it’s a monkey see monkey do thing. They are subconsciously trying to display the action they are requesting.
To be honest I’ve been noticing humans having a hard time with their senses since I was little. I distinctly remember my mom driving through a rotary once and turning the radio off. To my complaints, she said, “I need to see where I’m going.” I was in kindergarten and I felt that I had a better handle on my five senses than my mom. I guess it’s just something that happens when you grow up, you forget some things.
My proposal is a refresher course. I was thinking it could be at the eye doctor but that part is open to debate. My thought was there could be a section to go along with the eye exam that tests sense recognition. There would be 5 sections, and an array of things on a table in front. In random order, so nobody can cheat, there’s a loud noise, a bad smell, a blurry picture, a cold breeze, and then something that tastes bad. People have to choose between a mint, glasses, a jacket, earplugs, and a nose plug. Four out of five would be a pass, it’s natural to get confused once in a while. Anything below a four out of five would come with a requirement for a weekend seminar.
The reason I say the eye doctor is so they can make sure that people who fail their eyesight test will know to get glasses from them, not earplugs. The incentive for them to have this service could be the increased revenue of people buying their glasses. It could also be argued for the ear-nose-throat doctor to do it because they have knowledge of three out of the five senses. These tests would be every decade normally but also mandatory during times of public distress such as COVID.
Now, this proposal is just the beginning of tackling the things that COVID messed with. There would be a different seminar needed for people who tie pot lids in their hoodies as a mask and another one entirely for people who bought more than 12 rolls of toilet paper at a time. However, I do see this as the best way to start the recovery from COVID.
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