I don’t miss the shootings: Reflections on 2020

I sit in an admittedly privileged position as the year winds down, sipping my hot buttered rum from homemade batter my neighbor delivered and typing into a homemade computer my classmate loaned me. But I have a confession to make: 2020 wasn’t all bad.

Is it wrong to admit that 2020 had upsides? Is it unpatriotic? Maybe so, but hear me out because if there is one thing 2020 has taught me, it’s that the silver lining is too undervalued and easily ignored.

Let’s start with some agreed upon truths: 2020 was hard.

• Did one or more people in my immediate family contract COVID-19 and end up in the hospital? Yes.
• Am I making less money than I did a year ago? Significantly.
• Did the wildfires break my heart and rob me of some of the most special places I’ve seen? Definitely.
• Am I shaken to the core by how many Americans have had (or currently have) COVID-19 (20 million), how brutally high the U.S. death toll has grown (350,000) and how we’ve entirely failed at managing the crisis? Oh for sure.
• Have I had in-person conversations longer than 90 seconds with fewer than 25 people in the last nine months? Yep.
• Did I look in the mirror this year and see a racist looking back at me? Yeah, I have work to do.
• Did I rush online to buy emergency supplies in case the U.S. descended into civil war? You bet I did.
• Did I have mental breakdowns? Yes, but more on that another day.
• Am I alone almost all of the time? Uh-huh.
• Do I miss travel and concerts and cocktail bars and not having to clean up the kitchen every damn day? Absolutely.
• Do I miss RBG? So much.

But 2020 opened my eyes to a lot of truths, and (pardon the cliché) the truths are setting me free. Let’s start with some high points from the year:

1. Joe Biden won the election. At any point in the year, did you actually think he could do it? I didn’t. The DNC Convention gave me real hope, but the hope felt too fragile, so I woke up surprised when I heard fireworks in my neighborhood four days after Election Day as Biden was finally declared the winner. Dancing ensued.
2. A WOMAN WILL BE VICE PRESIDENT FOR THE FIRST TIME IN U.S. HISTORY! This is infinitely more exciting than Biden becoming President, but we aren’t talking about it enough.
3. All the post-election unrest I predicted did not materialize. Somewhere between how long it took to determine election results and how shockingly well the GOP performed, all momentum for rioting and protest evaporated. I am so okay with this.
4. WE HAVE A VACCINE LESS THAN A YEAR AFTER THE PANDEMIC BEGAN! And not just one vaccine, but an ever-growing number of them, viable and tested and already being distributed. This is an actual, real-life miracle folks!
5. We are all more conscious of the racism that pervades our society. We might disagree on how to fix it, but there’s no denying its presence at a systemic level anymore.
6. There were hardly any school shootings. Mass shootings of other types are down significantly too, in large part because there aren’t very many masses to shoot at. Call me grateful. My heart can’t handle the shootings. Let’s not allow them to come back as “normal.”
7. Stacey Abrams. Enough said.
8. SpaceX sent astronauts to the International Space Station! A private-sector business invested in technology to take Americans to space, and for the first time in a while we didn’t have to hitch a ride on a Russian craft.
9. People did some incredibly creative things to lift us up this year. I mean, have you seen the guy who raps Dr. Seuss? What about the guy who built an obstacle course for squirrels? And hats off to all the choirs, bands and orchestras who compiled performances one video clip at a time. And how about those masterpiece re-creations?
10. Madame Pele returned to Hawaii. After two and a half years with no fresh lava flowing on the Big Island, Pele returned on the longest night of 2020 to light up the summit. She spared the neighbors who live in her shadow by containing herself within the confines of her caldera, sheltered within the National Park, and she continues even now to put on a remarkable show.
11. Traffic has been unreal. I don’t leave home very often, but it has been months since I last sat in a traffic jam! And I live in Portland, Oregon! What a sweet relief it is to have predictable drive times. I will definitely miss this when it’s gone.
12. Can I get a shout out for gas prices? Anyone? Pork might be more expensive, but gas has been cheap.

And in my personal life:

1. I learned to cook. I didn’t want to, but here we are. And I don’t always hate it.
2. I am saving a helluvalotta money cooking for myself. Even on a salary halved from last December, I am living “large” because my new lifestyle is so simple. There is a lot to unpack from this learning because here’s what else:
3. I reduced my hours at work significantly. After that mental breakdown — right before the virus shut everything down — I haven’t been able to muster a 40 hour work week. And as it turns out, I can survive on less income. Less work brings less stress, more hours to recover and more energy.
4. I hiked and camped more in 2020 than in the past several years combined. And I want to make a habit of it. I saw more beauty than I can describe and ate more fresh huckleberries than I deserved.
5. I realized I’m not a loser. After years of feeling like a failure as a divorcee with no children, living alone and working jobs I don’t love, this year the table literally turned. Sure it feels strange to go weeks without talking to another human face-to-face, but dang am I glad I don’t live with someone who loathes me! I would far rather be alone for weeks or months on end than find myself in an unhappy relationship.
6. Childfree is the life for me. Holy crap, I am glad I am not trying to balance work and distance learning for a child or children. I am just tickled pink that I accidentally landed the life I needed in spite of what society told me I should want.
7. Christmastime doesn’t have to be depressing! The last few Christmases engulfed me with despair and resentment, watching like an outsider as families gather and traditions play out. But this Christmas? Even when I tried to feel like a failure, I couldn’t muster it. And I’m not even on any medications anymore!
8. Midlife crisis is easier to hide during a pandemic. I decided one of the better ways to pass time would be to retool my career, so I enrolled in a cybersecurity certificate program through the University of Oregon. I am now a month away from being certified. Like seriously, me… the girl who explains how the internet works like this: “it’s magic.” (Turns out I’m right.)
9. My introversion is a superpower. I now treasure my introversion instead of treating it as a weakness to overcome. In the months since lockdowns began, I found my old sense of humor, remembered how to play and endlessly entertained myself through my own imagination.
10. I let myself care. I discovered the extent to which I suppressed my feelings to survive in an extroverted world. As it turns out, I’m an empath, and in normal times, I “bruise” so frequently that I turn sarcastic and cold. But left alone with decent swaths of uninterrupted time, I care about literally everything. Yes it is inconvenient and you might call it weak, but it is entirely who I am and I am unwilling to suppress her anymore.
11. I’m learning what it means to love yourself. I used to pour a lot of energy into making other people happy, delighting other people. But until the pandemic, it felt too indulgent to pour a similar level of energy into myself. Suddenly, with no one around to delight and more energy than ever, I started planning surprises for myself, delighting myself, and it has been awesome. Case and point? My 39th birthday. I like birthdays and usually use mine as an excuse to go wine tasting or traveling, but without those options this year, I threw myself a walrus-themed party instead — which was a total blast. For six weeks, I scoured the internet for random walrus items. I bought birthday candles that looked kind of like tusks. I made my own walrus wrapping paper from a walrus stamp I found on Etsy and dressed as a walrus all day, including my half day of work. Friends and family members sent me walrusy things in the mail. And my Facebook community played along with gifs and donations to a walrus charity. Was I delighted? So much. Will I do it again? I hope so. But let’s face it: people will think I’m insane once traveling and wine tasting are options again.
12. I will never return to an office. I have long wanted to work from home but never felt like I could negotiate for it. Working from home for nine months now, I can say I love it. I am wildly productive, immensely more relaxed and I have 90 to 100 extra minutes every weekday because I have no commute. You guys, that’s like eight hours a week, which equates to one additional day of work or a great night’s sleep. I use the time to play piano, clean the kitchen, weed the yard, sleep in and make cocktails. My time and energy are worth more to me than a job that would require me to sit in an office again.
13. I gave up makeup, and I love it. I will never give up jewelry, but I now live the charmed life where most mornings, I roll from bathrobe to Zoom in less than 15 minutes. It’s like I’m a dude!
14. I learned to meditate. People have been urging me to meditate since 2006, but until this year, I had no tolerance for it. Now it sustains me. The five to ten minutes I spend separating myself from my thoughts prevent me from feeling overwhelmed and powerless against 2020’s news cycles.

I could go on and on. (I’ve fallen in love with moonrises. I became my own handyman. My yoga training from 2012 is really paying off. My neighbors take good care of me. I am closer to many of my friends than I’ve been in years even though we live very far apart.) But let’s sum it up this way: call 2020 weird, call it unprecedented, call it heartbreaking and eye-opening and chaotic, but don’t write it off as a lost year. There is a lot to learn from it, and not all of its teachings are painful.

Happy New Year everyone.