As we prepare to leave 2020 behind… 

I can’t tell you how many things have broken or reached their end of use in our house this past year. Our dishes, our TV (remember when our daughter shattered it?), our coffee machine…the list goes on. It’s all so ironic given how catastrophic 2020 turned out to be for everyone around the world, and how many people and things have been lost or broken. Now that we are at the very end of 2020, time for me to reflect on it all.

The Last Normal Thing I Did Before Quarantine

The last normal thing I did on my own before the shutdown began was attend a ribbon cutting on Thursday, March 12th for a new business in Tinley called Pekoe & Bean—which is still in business I’m happy to report.

For my daughter it was playing with her peers at Gymboree Open Gym the next day, on Friday March 13—I think we also did a quick grocery run at Jewel-Osco afterwards. So she has not been inside anywhere but our home and the home of my husband’s parents who live close by. I can’t wait to be able to take her indoor places again. But the last thing fun thing we all did together host a St. Patrick’s Day party at our house on Saturday March 14th. It was a fun affair and then Sunday rolled around and lockdown and quarantining began.

Quarantine Memes

2020 was not a fertile ground for fun. The social isolation is the worst part of it I think. But one of the good things that was able to come out of the wretch of a year were quarantine memes. And last week I saw this Bingo sheet swimming around on social media where you circle one of the many common things that have been done during quarantine, then you share your digital sheet with your friends and followers to see who did more things than you. The reward? Laughing at each other, making things feel a little more lighter. I was suprised I only could circle 16% of the bingo sheet; that’s 4/25. I think emotional eating should’ve been put on that Bingo sheet; the quarantine fifteen is real.

The Last Thing I Did In 2020

You see one of the memes that came about during quarantine is how we’ve all got ridiculously long hair because we don’t feel safe going to our hair stylist or barber. My husband’s locks were a point of laughter and tonight was the night for those locks to be buzzed off. As you’ll see in the photos below, things were getting a little wild hair wise for my husband Geoffrey.

I tried making this hashtag #Buzzcember happen since Movember existes. It didn’t take off, but oh well. It was fun for us cutting Geoff’s hair, making him look nice again. And my god do I have more respect for hair professionals. It’s not as easy of a job than we think.

The Year That Must Not Be Named

So what did 2020 represent for me?…Well, I wrote this article back in July, as a part of my Coronavirus Chronicles series of blog posts, where I ask what to call this year and tentatively at the time I called 2020 The Year Of Fill In The Blank. And it’s now the end of this unprecedented year and it begs the question, what best expresses what this year felt like and represented? I have no idea. So I ask you, what would you call the year 2020? Leave your thoughts in the comments section below or e-mail me at [email protected]. I’d love to hear your thoughts.

Making The Best Of The Worst

Though it’s hard to see the silver lining as we enter a new year, especially after all the sad news we’ve been reading since March when lockdown went into effect, there are some great things that came out of this year. If you need a list to cheer you up, GQ Magazine came out with this new article entitled The Best Things About the Worst Year Ever. The premise of the article is that if you look carefully, 2020 served up something surprising: fresh ideas that could dramatically improve our future. So though we’ve lost a lot, in the wake of the losses came forth adapting and innovation. We are not the sum of our losses and setbacks, we are what we become after we rise up from our falls. I know it’s hard when you feel like you’re drowning, but I also know that if you hold on and focus on the positive you do reach the surface again. Sometimes it just takes longer for some than others, but you’ll get there.

One last thing…

In order to put forth the best content I can for you, please take a few minutes to fill out this survey: https://forms.gle/nYqDt1XtQuAPJAKFA. It’s really important to me that I help moms. I wish I had had a manual or guide for navigating the Chicago Southland, Tinley Park, and motherhood when I moved here, so if there’s anything you can think of that could help a mom new to our area, please consider taking a moment and filling out my brief 2-question fill-in survey. 

Until next year, take care and stay safe, and HAPPY NEW YEAR!