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  2025-03-03

  Five Years Later

  A few things come to mind when I reflect on the pandemic of 2020. Toilet paper still seems to be one of my top thoughts. I quickly think about my family and how we were lucky to be spared. My husband was an essential worker, I was a student finishing up my masters degree and had a five and a two-year-old. I can’t say life was “normal” because of social distancing, masks, limitations on where we could go and what we could do. My oldest started kindergarten through a computer screen, there was new information (and disinformation) almost everyday and I can’t forget the civil rights protests that flooded every day news channels. What stuck to me was all the talk of a “new normal” while we were in this whirlwind. Looking back now it’s interesting to step back and realize that this, today, is that “new normal”. The masks are gone (some still wear them by choice) the toilet paper is back, and life just carried on. The biggest lesson learned is one I hope we can all agree on, one I hope we all share. Life is fragile. We’re here today and gone tomorrow, we should stop and savor each and every moment. Covid taught me to appreciate those around me because we never know when our time is up. I learned to be more compassionate, I owe that to the amazing Kit Harrington. Kit collected an amazing array of stories from peoples from all walks of life (if you haven’t taken a moment ti check that out, you totally should). The stories of all those people still affect me today. As different as everyone is, we always have something in common. I will always cherish the hours I spent listening to each and every one of those stories. My hope is that everyone takes a minute to reflect on their version of “new normal” that we remember the compassion we had for one another in a time when we weren’t sure what tomorrow would bring. The picture attached is one I just took, in a beautiful coffee shop enjoying my new normal.