nursingforsocialjustice

Everyday feels the same, but that’s only because I don’t have the same memories to use as cognitive markers to differentiate between the pieces of the year that I usually hang significant events on. My family and I never went on a summer vacation, we didn’t go back to where we grew up for a visit with family this year, my partner didn’t go to orientation on campus for his school program in the fall. These things didn’t happen. But other important things still happened. Those things just weren’t my usual things that break up the everyday. My kids still had their birthdays, the school year started, deadlines at work continued. It just happened in a different way compared to what I was familiar with. And that should be okay, for me, because on an individual level my life still moved on. It was not as exciting (marginally), but equally as meaningful.

But for some people many significant things happened. Things that break my heart. Some people lost their lives, some people lost loved ones (some many loved ones), for some this year was a radical change. For me, not so much.

And now the year is coming to a close. Collectively we have spent almost a year living though a pandemic. That should mean something. The collective strength is quite something. And we will look back on this one day, along with other important moments in history, to understand how it changed us. But today we have to figure out how to get through this collectively because at the end of all of this maybe the biggest takeaway is that humanity matters, people matter, love matters, compassion and respect and kindness matters. Maybe that’s all that matters.

Love,

Michelle D.