misreading 2020

 I saw a Christmas decoration of Santa peeing on a year sign of 2020. But I believe the sentiment is wrong. Not wrong like people don't get it, but wrong in assuming 2020 deserves to be peed on.

I think 2020  has given us a new perspective, of course in order to do that it had to seriously play with our old perspective, and perhaps that is what people don't like.

This year has several major challenges for those of us in the USA, and at least one or two for those of us world-wide.

We have the pandemic which I see as a challenge that has changed many ways things were done, has brought a new amount of tech in our lives. The pandemic has changed my life from one of running everywhere and eating 2-3 meals per day in my car to one where I am home, need to be home, to manage my kids on-line schooling stuff. (tech-love it, hate it). This summer I did massive amounts of gardening and loved being outside and watching plants grow. Using the produce also is fulfilling. Canning, drying, baking, freezing, it all makes eating a wrapped bar in the car seem kinda wrong.

Masks don't bother me. Sewing masks helped me feel useful to my fellow men. Wearing them makes me feel like I am respecting the life and rights of others, and research suggests it does.

Most of the social distancing doesn't bother me. In many ways, it helps me appreciate the interactions I do get with others, whether at the grocery store or stealing that hug from my mother. I do not mind wearing leggings all the time and not worrying about the PJs my preschooler refuses to take off. (I do worry about teaching him to wear clothes again, or finding out none of my pants fit anymore).

And I didn't really lose my job, it's there in some incarnation when I am ready for it (hehehe, maternity leave + on-line schooled kids) of course this made finances tighter, but there I am lucky and was just able to request the help I needed. I know many other people will struggle with this, but it is an opportunity to gain education or to hopefully find something better.

And that is one of the challenges of the pandemic is economic. Those who have money find that many local stores can not get things in that are selling because the factories have been shut down, or can't get raw materials in. I think it is opening many eyes to the challenges of long supply chains.

And of course, then there are racial tensions, the whites only notice it when it disrupts their daily lives or ends up on the news, even though it has been an underlying problem for hundreds of years. Being made aware is often not a gentle process. But the less gentle the process the more people may realize something is there.

And climate change marches on, bringing with it extreme weather events of all sorts. Apocalyptic scenes on the daily news. I realized as I was helping Ewan prepare a presentation on the Joplin F5 tornado in 2011, that no one says anymore that any single event can not be linked to climate change. It turns out it cans and has, since the outbreak of 2011 caused an increase in research and study. Basically, what happens as the arctic warms at 3 times the rate of the rest of the world this decreases the gradient of temps between the artic and midlatitude that causes the jetstream its stable course, so the jet stream ends up with big dips and curves and sometimes even ends up going longitudinally instead of latitudinally, that north/south movements locks the weather pattern in place and creates a longer front across the continent, bringing cold arctic air far south to bunch up with the superheated, moist air coming off the extra warmed Atlantic ocean and creating a perfect mix of stuff to produce strong storms of all sorts, and not just strong storms, but weather patterns that last for days instead of hours because the North/south jet stream patterns gets blocked into place. This blocking pattern also causes other weather to get locked into place- like the path of hurricanes this year, or dry - hot weather causing feeding the wildfires in the west.

And on top of all these fun things we have politics this year- oh yeah- a white house that has lied so often about so much that you know they have no clue what or where the truth really is, which makes it next to impossible to have a national response to any of the challenges listed above that we have faced this year. 

But the slowdown, that time to re-analyze instead of run. That time to focus on the really important- those things that truly matter when the rest of the world is upended- just happen to be the things that truly matter in eternity; Our relationships with God and our family (family can stretch to all the people we love). I believe that refocus change make 2020 one of the best years.