This is the first in a series of messages about what more and more people are calling The Great Reopening.

We’ve all worked very hard to get to this point. We’ve long looked forward to going to restaurants and cookouts without fearing for our lives. Now that time has, for all practical purposes, arrived (at least here in Berkshire County, Massachusetts, where we now go several days in a row without any new cases of COVID being reported). Yet there are things we will miss. Many of us will miss the spaciousness of our social calendars, the ease with which we could create space for solitude and reflection. Even with the most positive changes in our lives, there is a process of letting go that can be hard. It is ok to feel sad about some of the things about lockdown that you will miss. It is not wrong to have complicated thoughts and feelings about the good news of the end of the pandemic. Acknowledging the losses and grieving them will help you flow through the transition more easily.