Andrew Testa / The New York Times / Redux; Mark Peterson / Redux / The Atlantic
A post-pandemic discussion question: You get home from work on a Friday night and change into sweatpants. It’s been an exhausting week. A text message comes in. Your good friend wants to know if you’d like to meet up last minute for a drink, which is something that’s safe to do again. You’d love to catch up, but you’re pretty tired. Do you go?
This choose-your-own-adventure—or choose-your-own-lack-of-adventure—scenario is one that more Americans will start facing again soon, and their answer will indicate which of two competing post-pandemic impulses they feel more strongly.