2020: Quite a Year

 

2020 has been a memorable year.  It will be a year that will be highlighted in history books.  Collectively, the consensus seems to be that it has not been a good year.  It is a year many are happy to put behind us.

It was the year of the Covid-19 Pandemic which was for many a year of social distancing, mask wearing, having to stay at and work from home, and not travelling much, if even at all.  This certainly bothered many of us.   It was a sacrifice.  It was a hardship.  We yearned being able to gather and mingle with friends and family.  We missed not being able to, on a whim, go out for dinner.  We missed having to cancel vacations we were looking forward to.

But, if this was the extent of downside experienced, you have to consider yourself on the fortunate side in this pandemic year. 

For others who truly had the worst of it, this pandemic year was about the agonizing loss of friends and family members to the disease.  We were living under rules that prevented people from being bedside at the hospitals as loved ones were succumbing to the virus.  Then, the funerals and memorial services had very strict limits on how many could gather. 

I know a friend whose parents were in a nursing home.  They both contracted the virus and passed on within five weeks of each other.  I have another friend whose mother passed away, not from the virus.  Within the next month, her brother was infected with the virus and passed away.  In both cases, hospital visitations were prohibited, and the funeral and memorial services were limited to just a few.

I had a few other friends and several students who got the virus and survived, thank God.  The two friends, males about my age, really suffered with the disease but did recover.  My students, young men and women, had mild symptoms from which they bounced back quickly.

There were others, people in the lower economic strata people that work in factories, warehouses, and in the food supply chain.  They didn’t have the luxury of being able to work at home.  They had to go to their places of business if they wanted to keep their jobs.  For most, they had to keep their jobs to support themselves and their families.  It is no surprise that the incident rates soared for these folks.  Consider, also, those that worked in restaurants, movie theaters, and other sectors that got decimated in this unparalleled economic shift.  These folks had to live on government assistance that became totally politicized since the November election.

In the middle of all this, George Floyd was killed by a police officer in Minneapolis on national TV.  Floyd was face-down on the pavement, the policeman had his on Floyd’s neck, and asphyxiated him despite his pleas that he couldn’t breathe.  This incident sparked protests around the country with hundreds and thousands of people taking to the street to protest the racism that still grips this country.  The protests were for the most part peaceful.  There were many incidents of looting and destruction of store fronts and police cars.  People against and fearful of the Black Lives Matter movement, claimed the movement was populated with criminals and left-wing anarchists who wanted to bring down America.  People sympathetic or in the BLM movement, accused right-wing militia groups of instigating the violence and looting.  No matter who started the looting, there were protesters and others who took advantage the smashed windows of the stores to get themselves some goods. 

It was a year of a highly contested Presidential race and election.  The polarization of politics of the past forty years surged to new heights this year.  There was no middle ground.  People were either for Trump or Biden.  The people that were for Trump, were really for him.  They liked his brash, America first, no nonsense, “you tell ‘em Donald,” Fox News approach to politics and governance.  To me, the pro-Biden people were really anti-Trump people who wanted him out because of his ego-maniacal attitude and policies that weakened our stature in the world and ignored the problems of race, climate change, and the changing demographics of the country.  I think the election swung to Biden on Trumps handling of the pandemic.

Before the election, it was clear that if Trump won the elections, he woud deem them fair and claim he had a mandate from the American people, if he lost, he would claim election fraud.  The only thing I can say about him is that about half the people fervently support him, the other half fervently do not, and the middle ground is a lonely desolate place.

For Armenians, the first half of this fall was a horrible time for us with the War in Artsakh.  Azerbaijan under the direct military supervision of the Turkish army (a recent revelation), with Turkish supplied mercenaries, and drones from Israel and Turkey split Artsakh in two.  It was so sad and a devastating reminder of our history.  We were reminded, again, of Khirimian Hayrig’s message about the paper and iron ladles.  Our naïve Prime Minister was taken to school by Russia and Turkey
at the expense of the people of Artsakh who were driven off of their ancestral lands. 

There were four weddings we would have attended this year.  None were as the bride, groom, their families, nor friends would have imagined.  Like all social gatherings, the number of attendees was much smaller.  We watched three of the wedding ceremonies live via zoom and for the fourth, we were sent a video after the fact.  These four couples did indeed get married, they started their lives together and may or may not have more festive celebrations. 

We all had to do, as the Clint Eastwood character in the movie Heartbreak Ridge, said.  “You adapt. You overcome. You improvise.”  We did exactly that at work, in family life, and in our social interactions with other.

It was a troublesome and concerning year in many ways.  Everyone is looking forward to putting this year behind us and start fresh in 2021. 

There are lessons we can and should take with us into 2021.  More on that tomorrow.