As we stood outside the county’s convention center on Friday afternoon, we felt more than the warmth of the sunshine and more than the expected glow of new graduates. The exuberance that surged through the crowd of Guilderland graduates streaming from their commencement ceremony, diplomas in hand,  pulsed with a feeling of freedom.

Yes, as with any graduates, they were free to set off on their own paths in life. But there was an added sense of joy. After a year and a half of wearing masks, they could at last smile at one another.

And they could hug. A mother, bouquet in hand, wrapped her arms around her red-haired daughter and they hugged, leaning into each other, for a very long time. Several beautiful young women intertwined their arms and danced together in the street, smiles flashing as high-heeled shoes beat out a staccato rhythm.

For weeks now, as we go about our daily work of assembling a newspaper, we’ve been hearing about the joys of breaking free of the one-time essential pandemic restrictions.

Our Guilderland history columnist, a retired social studies teacher, emailed this message as she sent in a recent column: “I am now all vaccinated, have passed the two-week mark and plan on going out to lunch at Tops Diner with three of my fellow Mohonasen retirees on Monday. I’m so excited, you’d think it was a grand ball!”

Our Bethlehem library columnist, sending in her column, emailed, “This week our library lifted the mask requirement for staff and it was amazing to see some faces I hadn’t seen in months. We actually had a couple of new hires during the pandemic whose faces we had never seen. I hope we continue to move in this positive direction.”

And a friend wrote to us, “It was a beautiful day. I had my first handshake in over a year today at lunch.”

We wrote back, “Do you think, as our world returns to normal, we’ll keep our heightened appreciation of all those things we took for granted until we lost them?”

He replied with a quote from Thronton Wilder’s play, “Our Town.” In the play, Emily asks, “Does anyone ever realize life while they live it … every, every minute?”

The stage manager replies, “No. Saints and poets maybe … they do some.”

“I guess I’d better work on my poetry if I want to be among that group,” my friend wrote.

We can’t all be poets. But we can, each of us, try to hold onto the feeling of joy we have at this moment in the pleasures of human interaction that were so long denied as we strove for the greater good, as we lived in isolation to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.

I remember, after surgery, when I hadn’t been allowed to drink for what seemed like an eternity, as I had my first sip of water, I thought I would never forget that moment and would never again take for granted that simple pleasure. But I did.

Maybe the return to normalcy, now that restrictions have been lifted, will once again be just that — normal. Perhaps the human psyche cannot exist in a state of perpetual euphoria.

But, still, we can appreciate these times for what they are and also look back to the months of restrictions to see what emerged of value and preserve that as we move forward.

Perhaps counterintuitively, as each of us was isolated in our own cocoons, more of us participated in society at large, in mechanisms essential to our government — watching town and village meetings and voting.

When Governor Andrew Cuomo last Thursday lifted the state of emergency he had imposed on March 7, 2020, among the over 100 executive orders that ended was one allowing governments to conduct virtual meetings.

We believe meeting in person has great value and we will be happy to see the many boards we cover in action rather than through our computer screens. We also believe that citizens who attend these meetings will now have an easier time making their views known.

But, at the same time, we urge our municipalities to continue to stream their in-person meetings so that citizens can watch their elected and appointed officials from home. Often, in our small towns, a parent without ready childcare doesn’t want to leave home or an elderly resident doesn’t drive.

This needn’t be a costly undertaking. Hilltown citizens have recorded meetings on their cell phones and then streamed them online. Both Altamont and Guilderland film meetings and broadcast them on the local cable channel.

A second important benefit to democracy that was enhanced during the pandemic was voting by mail. Voting is a cornerstone of democracy.

We are deeply troubled that so few people bother to vote. Since the 2020 presidential election, as 28 states have now passed voting restrictions, it becomes even more clear that we must do all we can to preserve this right.

We have been particularly disappointed in recent years by the low turnout at school board and school budget elections. These votes not only determine the future direction of our schools, and therefore our youth, but also involve hefty sums of money, far more than our local municipal budgets.

In 2020, when residents could mail in ballots, the number of voters increased three-fold. In 2021, when the usual absentee voter restrictions applied, the numbers sunk back to their usual lows.

Statewide in November, New Yorkers will have a chance to vote on whether the state legislature should pass a statute for no-excuse absentee voting. This is a change that would allow anyone to vote by mail for any reason.

Right now, New York is one of only 16 states that require voters to provide an excuse to receive an absentee ballot. 

Another state constitutional amendment to be decided by voters in November would allow New Yorkers to register to vote right up to Election Day. New York would be joining 20 other states and the District of Columbia if this were adopted.

We wholeheartedly approved of this measure as well. The easier it is for people to vote, the better all facets of our citizenry will be represented. Voting is a right that Blacks and women struggled mightily to achieve.

We must not be complacent about our duties as citizens. Democracy will wither if the majority of Americans do not exercise their rights.

Think of it as sacred, and as essential to the life of our body politic as water is to our body — as sought after as that first cool sip of water after surgery. Or that embrace after long months of isolation.

Do not take your rights as a United States citizen for granted. Exercise them.