This morning I am sitting on my couch, sipping coffee, smelling leftover maple syrup on the plate next to me, and contemplating what I learned, felt and observed in 2020.
I thought this would be a difficult thing to write about considering everything that has and continues to happen in 2020. There is just SO MUCH.
How do I extract anything meaningful from the rubble?
For me, the best approach is to just start writing. No outline. No plan.
Maybe a few minor revisions along the way but mostly just free-flowing writing to get thoughts, ideas and feelings out of my head. They might not make sense now but maybe something will click later for me.
So here it goes...
The Covid-19 pandemic has been the most impactful for me personally but I have also witnessed tremendous political divide and racial inequity this year. I am not a political person and I have never considered myself knowledgeable on topics of race and racism, or the history of any of it.
2020 changed that.
In 2020 I really pushed myself to seek to understand. It didn't matter what the topic was, I really tried to consider all perspectives, especially those that made little to no sense to me. I put some emphasis on not looking away when things didn't make sense to me or didn't apply to me.
I think one thing I learned this year is that things that I thought didn't apply to me, DO APPLY to me. As a white woman in America, my voice and my vote matters. Not just for me and people that look like me. My voice and vote matters to people who look nothing like me. In fact, it might actually matter MORE to them.
When my kids were little I enrolled them in a Spanish Immersion elementary school. When people in my personal and professional circles learned of this, I was frequently asked why I would choose an immersion school for my kids.
There were many reasons but my number one reason was I didn't want my kids to grow up thinking that the world started and stopped in their little community.
I wanted my kids to understand diversity.
Their time at that school taught me as much as it taught them. I'm grateful for their experiences at that school as much as I'm grateful for my experiences at that school.
One thing I witnessed in 2020 was a large number of people struggling to maintain any sense of composure.
This is not a criticism necessarily. There were many things to be rightfully angry and upset about.
I think what stood out to me was how many people got and STAYED angry. There was an apparent inability to regulate emotions. To de-escalate oneself. To use words without shaking fists and all caps and exclamation marks.
You know the airplane saying about putting on your own oxygen mask? I feel like people didn't put on their oxygen mask or help a neighbor with theirs, but were instead yelling at the people around them that they were doing it wrong.
There was a lot of incoherent noise in 2020.
The views and perspectives were likely important but nobody can hear you when they are struggling to breath. Or when you are.
Slow down. Take a breath. Try again.
In 2020 I learned that I don't want to spend time shaking my fist at the sky, at cars in traffic, at poorly considered social media posts, or people with views that I don't fully understand.
Seek to understand.
I do want to be the person that appreciates what I have, including having the opportunity to participate in activities that benefit others. So I changed up where I spend my charitable dollars and volunteer time.
I dove into the history of racism in America and was astonished at what I failed to learn in my youth, in the news, and in other life experiences. I can't believe I got to 50 years of age with blinders over top of a blindfold in a room with black-out curtains. There was so much that I was oblivious to.
I should probably be embarrassed by my lack of knowledge but I can at least now say:
I'm here.
I see you.
I'm sorry.
I'm learning.
How can I help?
I was lucky to be born white and live in a society that doesn't feel threatened by the color of my skin. My dialect is not threatening after dark. I have a first and last name that speaks my whiteness, giving me privilege when my name is read from a database or sheet of paper.
Privilege exists in some really bizarre ways and I'm trying to be mindful of that.
2020 was not a waste of a year for me.
In many ways, it was one of my most eye-opening years of my life and has already moved me in the direction of good change and perhaps even a little good trouble.