No more decisions, please

Like Lorin Clarke, the creator of the charming Fitzroy Diaries podcast, and the author of this Tweet, I am spent. I’m burnt out. Should I ride the train? Grab a coffee? Send my kids to child care? How close to that unmasked stranger is too close? Big choices and small ones have drained me of every ounce of judgement. After months of following the numbers, checking exposure sites, and making choices that affect my children (too young to get vaxxed) and my in-laws (vaxxed but elderly), I, too, would never like to make a decision again. Please, Brett Sutton, tell me what to have for breakfast. I don’t have the strength.

Still, I can’t help but be interested in my own exhaustion. How long will it last? And how far does it extend? When will I be ready to customise a piece of complicated software again? (I can’t be arsed, as I once apparently could, building new templates in Scrivener, or changing all the key commands in Audacity).

When will I be up to doing the research required to make a big purchase? (I need a dryer. Guess I’ll just buy whichever comes up tops when I Google ‘dryer’). What about selecting a pair of socks in fewer than 60 stultifying seconds? (I have a lot of fun socks). And if I’m not ready to make decisions, who will I trust — designers, brands, relatives, scientists, politicians, social media personalities — to make them for me? Who does it feel natural to trust? That’s a question we all need to ask ourselves as we back away from choices.

Look at the people we find trustworthy, at their gender, communication style, class and cultural background. Or maybe I’ll ask Brett to do my introspection for me