February 6, 2025
Sunny weather and still trapped by COVID: Are the kids going to be okay?
Isolation can magnify the effects of mental illnesses and psychological problems among children, such as anxiety, depression, loneliness, despair.
Isolation can magnify the effects of mental illnesses and psychological problems among children, such as anxiety, depression, loneliness, despair.

April is famously the cruellest month because that is when flowers start growing in The Waste Land, T.S. Eliot’s 1922 poem of cultural decay.

Likewise, as school wraps up for Canadian children, this is shaping up to be a cruel, cruel summer, as in the 1984 Bananarama song about heatwave heartache, because sunny weather is a sad time to be alone.

As dated as those references are, kids today still get it. There is a painful contrast in June quarantine, when summer would otherwise burst into life.

Children of all ages are resilient. Many have bravely withstood the cancellations of sleepaway camp, day camp, activities, sports leagues, amusement parks, concerts, holidays.