I think so many people are going to be uncomfortable in so many once 'normal' situations for a very long time. It will vary with people, depending on where they live, how locked down they have been, how compromised they see themselves, how strict their state regulated things, how much news they watched, how many people they knew who got sick or died, etc., as to just how uncomfortable and for how long.
What I will say, as someone who lives very rural, and goes into a city of about 50,000 for all our work/school/shopping/entertainment needs, is that for a very large part of America, nothing really changed during much of this last year.
They still had to go to work every day (of course the way they did their jobs, masks, distancing, barriers etc. were changes). They still shopped (again, some restrictions, especially early on), and for many places, most things have been open at some capacity for many many months (since early last summer for sure). In this town we frequent, the traffic, parking lots, etc are just as full as pre pandemic and have been since late last spring. There really was only a true shutdown in Ohio during the first couple of months a year ago. After that, we have been able to get into salons, gyms, stores of all kinds, restaurants etc. even when on limited capacities.
I never liked going to the movies anyway, especially a full theater. Germy place, and bedbugs are a big issue in many of them. So I'll be a long time going back there myself, but not just because of Covid. I finally went in to dine in a restaurant a couple of weeks ago, my first time in a year. It was an ok experience, but only because it was a Wed. and the place was not busy. I don't see me heading out during the weekend into packed restaurants any time soon, unless the reported cases fall off to almost nothing.
I had covid back in November, it was no worse for me than a good bout with the flu, lasted about a week, and I didn't feel fully recovered for about a month. Just had another episode of something last week, I'm guessing was more of a cold with a sore throat, chills, aches, sneezing, and a bit of sinus stuff. again lasted about five days total.
What I have come to realize is I have missed some things, but much of the stuff I chose to stop doing to help protect my mom who I have to care for sometimes, I really don't miss after a year, and I won't be going back to it on the same level I once did.
Things like dining in restaurants, I can do without for the most part, and will for a long time, be just a once in a while thing. I've come to get used to using drive thru at fast food, bank, pharmacy etc. instead of going in, and I think I will continue to do a lot of that, especially during flu and cold season. I used to go in most places, and now I find the drive thru to be a smarter choice, less exposure, and less likely to spend money.
I used to enjoy thrifting, and being pretty much away from that for the last year, I kind of feel I've broken that habit as well. It just feels like a lot of things are no longer a desire for me to participate it.
I'm more interested in feeling safe with family again. Every time my adult son, wife and child come into contact with us, I worry about transmitting something to my mom later. But I will say, the more we do get together, the less stressful/uncomfortable I am with it all.
Barring a bad new wave of this virus or it's mutations, I am hoping to feel the comfort level in being among others in all the old settings to be back no later than mid summer for myself. The thing I look most forward to is no masks. I hate them. For a number of reasons. When those start to disappear, that is where I will be feeling uncomfortable. I don't really buy into just how effective they are (just unsure of it) but I've worn once since the beginning, and they have become a (false??) sense of security, and I know I will feel exposed and ill at ease as they disappear, but I can't wait for it to happen.
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