Learnings & Silver Linings from This Wild Time in Human History
We had a photoshoot at work recently and Dan and I had our photographer snap this shot so that we could have a portrait of life in 2020.
Only a few days into 2020, I started to sense that this year was…different. Something shifted almost instantly once January hit and I could feel it—no idea what “it” was.
The year started out feeling kind of…strange? But it was good-strange at first. And honestly, before things took a turn for the worse, 2020 was fun—it was really fun actually. For the first few months of the year I felt like I was on an unpredictable adventure that was taking me to all sorts of unexpected places.
All of the sudden I was driving down to Nashville for a last-minute work trip for Devon Gilfillian’s album release party. Then I was in Columbus visiting friends for a beer festival…then off to Chicago for another work trip…and then to NYC to visit my friend Kim because I found a cheap flight that was impossible to pass up. And that was just in January.
In February, Dan and I booked a trip to Tulum, Mexico to celebrate our wedding anniversary, and then the following weekend I traveled home to New England for my bestie’s baby shower and I had a lovely weekend visiting with family and friends.
But then almost immediately upon flying back from Boston to Detroit, COVID-19 turned from a potential concern to a serious threat, and everything and everyone went into quarantine…and here we are now.
Six. Months. Later.
It’s been a “coronacoaster” of ups and downs for sure, but overall I am ok. I am healthy. I have a job and a roof over my head, and I have been trying (mostly successfully) to make the best of it…because what else can you do?
I wouldn’t go so far as to call myself an optimist, but I’m certainly someone who looks for silver linings, and if I had to list them out, these would be my personal learnings & silver linings from COVID/quarantine/2020/this-wild-time-in-human-history:
I am absolutely, undoubtedly, 100% a work-from-home person—which doesn’t surprise me in the slightest, but now it’s confirmed.
It turns out that I’m a workout-from-home person too, because I have been more consistent with my online workouts than I was with my in-gym workouts, and I might even be in better shape than I was when all this started.
I don’t have to travel far to travel. I was still able to feel like I got away by taking a few short trips within driving distance this summer and they were honestly just as enjoyable and vacation-esque as trips I would have booked flights for in different parts of the country. Sidenote: But let’s be clear, this Sagittarius is very excited to take an international vacation the moment that becomes safe and possible again.
While a lot of us have a hard time embracing change, humans are very adaptable creatures. Wearing a mask, keeping social distance, sanitizing the shit out of everything, and having meetings and hangouts on Zoom instead of in-person became normal for us so quickly, and while I don’t like how normal these things feel now, I’m hopeful that when this is all over (it has to end at some point, right?), we can just as quickly adapt back to the reality that we used to take for granted. 🤞
Eating In > Eating Out. I love going out to eat—I really do, but I eat a lot healthier being at home more and I’ve realized that the majority of the time I was eating out before was just for the convenience factor, not because I was necessarily all that excited about the food I was ordering. I am still making an effort to support local restaurants, but I have really been enjoying cooking for myself more—which is definitely a new thing.
On another food related note, it is definitely more cost effective to do a big grocery shop once a week rather than shopping for 1-2 meals at a time. We never used to do that and would always just buy things that we needed here and there, and I’ve realized how much more expensive and inefficient it is to shop that way. It’s been great having a full fridge and a stocked pantry!
Technology is a goddamn miracle. Yes, it has a long list of cons, but there are some definite pros too, and while Zoom fatigue is real and in-person connection can’t be replaced by a screen, we’ve got to give technology some credit for making this time a lot more bearable than it would have been if we were locked in our homes with no contact with the outside world. Plus, I have really been enjoying having access to different yoga teachers all over the world and participating in all sorts of virtual classes and offerings that weren’t even on my radar pre-COVID. I’ve even done a bit of virtual-yoga-teaching myself and it has surprisingly been really great.
With indoor gatherings of any type pretty much banned for the foreseeable future, we’ve been spending a lot more time outdoors than we normally would and it’s been great*. I love taking long walks outside and working in my garden and eating & drinking outside at restaurants and bars and sitting around by a fire pit at night…can everything just be outside from now on? *Says Danne in the summer and fall. Winter is coming, we’ll see how I feel then.
Blow drying my hair, painting my toenails, wearing a bra, and putting on mascara every day are all completely unnecessary. I’m trying to lean into the au naturale look more lately. Trying…
Slippers and scented candles spark so much joy for me in my work-from-home life. I have 3 pairs of these slippers and a drawer full of Detroit Rose candles, and maybe it’s a bit indulgent, but little things like this are really helping to lift my spirits right now.
In general, slowing down isn’t as scary as I thought it would be. I typically travel quite a bit and am perpetually in motion, but I haven’t minded staying still for a little while. Before this pandemic, everyone and everything seemed to be moving at an unsustainable and exhausting pace and we all collectively needed some sort of pause/reset/something—but yeah…this has been going on for a lot longer than any of us would like. I’m ready for the renaissance portion of the plague.
There’s no way around it—this is a hard year. I miss my family. I miss my friends. I miss so much and I’ve missed so much, but it is what it is right now and there isn’t much I can do about it except to wear my mask, keep my physical distance, and keep trying to search for silver linings.
I’m all for a good plot twist, but goddamn 2020, goddamn…
