Almost everywhere you look, you’ll see someone wearing a mask these days, and that’s a good thing.

You’ve probably heard more than one person complain about face coverings in the “new normal” we now live in thanks to COVID-19. I’ve done my share, pointing out to my wife that it’s hard to breathe. She reminds me that working in a medical office, she has to wear one all day every day, so that usually refreshes my memory about how lucky I am to not be in the same boat, and I’ll stop complaining for a while.

To my own surprise, I’ve actually come to embrace the mask a bit lately, and I hope everyone will for safety’s sake. In fact, it dawned on me recently that protecting myself and others with a mask doesn’t have to be a boring thing. For decades people have been sharing things about themselves on shirts and other clothing, whether it be their favorite sports team or a personal statement of some sort. Why not do the same with our masks?

That’s exactly what has happened, and now many companies are making masks fun and stylish for us while we stay safe. I’ve seen them with everything from humorous images to political statements and expressions of a person’s favorite sports team lately. I’ve even seen others that expressed the person’s opinion of the mask, with the message, “This mask is useless.”

On a recent trip to a local hardware store, I noticed a young man with a mask that featured bloody shark teeth, and it was clearly an image from the 1970s movie Jaws. People interested in politics have been showing support for their favorite candidates, and the list goes on and on.

Personally, I decided to show my sports fandom a bit with a baseball-themed mask. It features the pattern of a baseball scorebook, which I love to keep while watching a game in person, so that was right up my alley. I have another with newspaper print featuring headlines about man walking on the moon and some other historical headlines.

I’m keeping my eyes open for more masks that interest me and taking every opportunity to have some fun while following the guidelines during the COVID-19 pandemic. If you’re one of those folks who would rather not wear a mask, maybe this approach can help you have a little more fun with it, too, while helping us all stay safe.