DEATH OF POLITE SMILES

DEATH OF POLITE SMILES How masks have ruined our social lives Charli Esposito | Staff Reporter

For the first time in our lives, smiling at and greeting friends on the way to class through the hallways has never felt so ... dead.

Rest in peace to the polite smile.

Our generation has never dealt with the inability to engage in social activities. Instead of social gatherings, we socially distance. Instead of a little smile when you walk past an acquaintance, it’s awkward eye contact mixed with a little social torment.

These common interactions have become obsolete since COVID-19. Mandatory mask restrictions leave us with the majority of our faces covered and, most importantly, our smiles.

Masks have become an annoying social epidemic to the actual pandemic.

Our generation is undergoing this awkward phase where every morning when we put our masks on for seven hours of school, and therefore we lose the social aspects of our educational experience.

Masks killed the only fun parts of high school.

Fortunately, though masks have our back when it covers our jaw-dropping reaction to a teacher’s awful fashion decision. Maybe, just, maybe that mask kept you from getting a detention because no one can see you mouth that potty word that slipped when you forgot to study for your marine biology test.

So, what will you do now when the kid who helped you pass biology freshman year tries to grab your attention? Ignore her? Have a staring contest? Wave like you’re Forrest Gump on a shrimp boat and you just saw Lieutenant Dan? Run the other way? That’s for you to figure out on your own.

And this is not an eulogy to the polite smile, but rather a reminder of how awkward you will feel the next time you smile at someone under your mask.

I hope you end up making awkward eye contact and cringe when you hold it for too long. I hope you make eye contact with the kid you had a huge crush on freshman year and have to scurry away before things get weird.

Even so, you must always wear your mask even through the pain and grief from the death of the polite smile :)