As my colleague John Thomason recently wrote, it’s unlikely that we’ll be able to casually traipse the globe even post-coronavirus - whether that’s due to the fear of a future pandemic or your standard sense of climate-driven flygskam (or “flight shame”). Well, the flight part far more than the rest of it - due to the fossil fuels planes require to get around. Those vehicles are also frowned upon from a climate perspective. Despite the fact you can still technically catch a flight or hail a taxi, most medical professionals say it’s best to stay at home as much as you possibly can. If you want to go to Cabo, for example, you probably have to get to the airport by car or bus or subway and then onto a plane and then into a taxi or rental car or something once you land in the airport in Mexico, and that doesn’t even take into account those shuttle things in the airport! And all of those are, for now, pretty well off-limits due to the possibility of contracting or transmitting COVID-19.
Responsible social distancing measures leave us with precious few options to get away right now.
Except in this case, that desire to bolt is not so much the body’s biological response to an acute threat as it is a more general sense of coronavirus lockdown-induced longing. That’s a really natural response to crisis: fight or flight, you know. I get the sense that you’re looking for an escape, and trust me, I relate.