Worst part of Covid is the cover-up of smiles

A Different View with Dave O’Connell

It was John Prine who famously sung about his illegal smile – although in his case, it was a reference into happiness that might have been helped on its way with a contribution from artificial stimulants.

These days smiling isn’t illegal of course, but because, for the most part, you have to do it behind a face covering, it makes it kind of tricky – and difficult to spot.

That’s not entirely true obviously, because we are allowed to walk the streets with faces uncovered even if quite a number opt to leave their mask on.

But while we’re not going to pick of fight with the anti-maskers any more than we would be the anti-vaxxers – or people who shout and shake their fists at the wind generally (or Novak Djokovic or even his mother) – we can lament the lack of visible facial expression that’s the consequence of a cover-up.

It’s ironic of course as well to mention John Prine and Covid in the one piece, because it was Covid that robbed the music world of his unique talent. And that should be another good reason to protect ourselves from suffering the same fate.

It’s only some days that you’d miss seeing a smile, because we know that the mask can help save lives – but how sad it is that such a casual and fleeting greeting has to be hidden.

The one thing is that you can at least still tell genuine smilers from forced ones – because their eyes light up; they still twinkle over their mask.

The fake smilers only ever moved their lips; their smiles never made it past the nose – more of a grimace than a greeting.

So now all of that happens unbeknownst to the rest of the world – and we’re none the wiser because it doesn’t rise to embrace their entire face.

Mask wearing has been a drag for almost everyone – except curmudgeons and publicity-shy For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.

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