The week our clocks sprang forward last month, I saw an Instagram post that went something like this: “Why are we complaining about losing an hour when we just lost an entire year?”
I laughed at the irony, but the caption also prompted some thoughts about 2020, the pandemic and our own individual responses to it all.
It’s been a year, hasn’t it? A year of unexpected—sometimes even shocking—headlines, heartbreak, disappointment, layoffs, closures, cancellations and empty store shelves.
There’s no end to the conversation about all this, especially now as we’ve moved past the 12-month mark of when it all began (or when it all ended, as the case may be). I understand where people are coming from when they talk about how weary they are and how it’s often hard to see where God is in everything that has happened since last March.
Spring break was pretty low key for us this year. We made a quick weekend trip to see our college girl, and then mostly stayed around the house the rest of the time.
Molly was deep into a book series, but she took a break one day to make soft pretzels with me. I don’t know about you, but I love soft pretzels. Maybe even more than cilantro and avocados. (And that’s saying something.)
In early March, I started reading On Writing Well: The Classic Guide to Nonfiction by William Zinsser, a book that has sold more than a million copies since it was first published in 1976.
A few days later, I learned that my alma mater—where I earned a bachelor’s degree in journalism almost three decades ago—is shuttering its communications division. Current students are upset, of course, but I understand the market forces that led to this decision. The field has changed dramatically over the years, and the university is doing its best to keep up with the times.
I was driving to the doctor last week. I’ve been down this same road hundreds of times over the years. Along the paved trail that runs next to the creek that goes through our city. Past the high school and middle school that both daughters attended, past the corporate headquarters of the international tech company that employs so many people in our area.
Over the bridge that spans the interstate, past the onramp that leads to the town where I grew up, and—finally—past the hospital and medical buildings where I spent so much time with my parents.
Something happened this past year that’s never happened before.
No, not that. Or that. Or even THAT.
I’m talking about the fact that my Christmas cactus didn’t bloom. Not before Christmas, and not even around Valentine’s Day, which it has been known to do before.