POLITICS

Masks Work Fantastically Well for Keeping Your Neck Warm

But you must always be ready to apologize

Markup by author

“I don’t know why I’m wearing this”, he said sheepishly while pulling his mask down to his neck.

He was talking to the unmasked and decidedly more masculine man in front of me in the checkout line. The apologetic near-man was one aisle over; apparently these two knew each other, probably from some lib bashing poker game or whatever.

The macho unmasked man had already sized up me with my KN95 mask as the pinko commie atheist ACLU liberal that I am and had twitched his lip just enough to express his disgust. I had three inches on him and lacked his protruding beer belly, so I did not avert my eyes in shame as he rightfully expected. I know him anyway; he lives a few streets away and flies a “Let’s Go Brandon” flag on his pickup truck. A great guy if you like third-grade humor and a predictable conversation.

No, I reminded myself, he’s not all that bad. He probably thinks he’s safe because he’s fully vaxxed. And the flag? Freedom of speech, so what? The twitch probably had nothing to do with me, either. Stop assuming bad intentions.

I sighed deeply and immediately regretted it. I had already passed many maskless men as I shopped. I had also…