2020: Some Thoughts

Be warned. This is VERY stream on consciousness.

I was thinking today about how I should have been documenting what COVID life, the election year and just the general mess of 2020 has been. In list form, here’s how we’re doing:

• Nate stopped traveling in March

• I painted the apartment and hung all the shelves and photos I’ve been saying I’ll “get to”

• We went to our last restaurant on my birthday weekend in February

• I started working from home at the end of March

• I baked A LOT of cookies and cakes

• I got officially promoted at my job

• We got cocktail deliveries from James (one of our favorite Biltong bartenders)

• We started to do weekly Saturday porch dates with Kim and Jason (our neighbors to the left) in April

• My mom got furloughed

• We basically didn’t see anyone except Kim and Jason until May

• Park charcuterie date with Don and Hannah

• Voted in the GA primary. Stood in line for 2 and a half hours and wore a mask.

• Took my first real camping trip Memorial Day to 30A

• Successfully avoided crowds during the beach trip. Witnessed firsthand the mess that is Florida’s response to COVID

• AJ moved to GA

• The George Floyd/Black Lives Matter protests and curfews

• Hiked Stone Mountain at Sunrise

• Vince and Milly took over our kitchen to make gnocchi and apple pie

• Going away party for Charlie’s move to Alabama

• Made dumplings and a tofu soup feast with Milly and Vince

• Celebrated the Fourth of July Tiki Style with Milly, Vince, Kim, Jason and AJ

• Ate a lot of takeout from Cooks and Soldiers

• Did a virtual wine tasting/Drunk Wine School with Don and Hannah

• My mom’s position was officially eliminated

• Said no to a lot of events – including weddings and bridal showers

• Paid off Nate’s private loans

• Lots of Zoom calls with friends all over the country

• Did Fetes De Bayonne dinner at home and won a gift card for my Instagram post about it

• Played virtual cards with Kim and Jason while they were in Colorado

• Madeline announced her move to Texas and her job with Anthem

• Started looking at and saving for a house

This year looked nothing like what we planned. We had so many trips on the docket. So many events. So many places we wanted to go, concerts we wanted to see, new restaurants we wanted to try. 2020 feels like the lost year, but I can’t help but look at that list above and be appreciative of the memories we’ve been able to make and things we have been able to do.

Nate and I have taken COVID really seriously. I am the only one who is going into my small office. I grocery shop once a week and do it all in one trip. We do contactless pickup for everything we can. We haven’t been out to a bar or restaurant. We have seen maybe 6 people socially (ant not all at once) and all outside/in each other’s homes.

We saw Nate’s mom in May when she moved AJ down but aside from that, we haven’t seen any family since last Christmas/Thanksgiving. We haven’t traveled except for the one beach camping trip over Memorial Day where we were at a campsite where it was literally just us and we went to a basically abandoned beach.

We’ve been so responsible and it’s starting to really wear us down. We keep seeing and hearing about people getting on airplanes to travel, going out to bars and restaurants like nothing has changed and visiting with friends and family who haven’t been social distancing or being responsible. As people who have been quarantining since March, it’s infuriating.

Put that in the same basket as this insane election year and we haven’t been at our best.

But I’m grateful for that too.

Sometimes I tell Nate that I wish 2020 never happened. Or I wish we could go back to normal. Or I wish we could just be done with this now. It’s usually in the middle of me breaking down about something.

He usually responds with, “yeah, this sucks. But I wouldn’t wish it away because of how much it’s helped us grow in our marriage and as people.”

We’ve had lots of HARD conversations in quarantine. Conversations about politics. About racism in our country. About equity in the economy. About how we’re going to use this year as a growing experience. About how we’re both really struggling with depression and anxiety. About how we feel lost sometimes. About how grateful we are for how our lives have changed and about how our friendships have grown.

2020 feels like a lost year. But in lots of ways it feels like a year where we have found so much. We’ve found more strength and support in each other than I think we knew we had. We’ve battle tested our marriage and found out that even after being around each other for six months straight, we’re just falling more in love with each other.

We’ve been able to lean on each other when one of us isn’t strong. We’ve been forced to actually deal with disagreements and face them head on to come to common ground. We’ve been better about communicating and saying “I’m not okay” and that’s made a difference.

COVID has made me more grateful for everything and everyone in my life. It forced me to come out of the haze of “I’m too busy” and focus on what’s around me. It made me realize who are those people you WANT and NEED in your life. Regardless of distance or not being able to see them in person.

This is one of the craziest years I have ever experienced. A global pandemic, an impending recession, a national reckoning with racism, an election year, and not having anything be “normal.”

I don’t know if we would have gotten the chance to slow down and just deal with the mess and chaos of our lives without this. I don’t think we would have been forced to stand in place and ask ourselves “what actually matters to me.”

2020 has changed everything and I think that in some ways we needed it. This year will ripple out through generations. It’s going to change things forever. How are you going to answer the calls to change?