Hopeful, Maybe
Forest wildflowers from my daily dog walk.
“I didn’t want things to be normal or the same anymore.” Courtney Carver in Project 333
In her Project 333 book, Courtney Carver, is referring to simplifying her life. Normal was just too much.
There's a lot of talk these days about things returning to "normal". I even used that word in a title of a blog post I wrote at the beginning of the pandemic. It's an interesting word: "normal". I fondly remember a dear client telling me once in an organizing session that "normal" was a setting on her dryer. Nothing else. I love that and hope she's reading this.
Like Courtney Carver, I am not sure if I want to go back to "normal" either. After all that has happened in the last few months, I am hopeful, maybe, that we humans can do better than our 2019 normal. I don't want things to go back to normal if it means we just move on and forget about all the people who died, got sick, lost their livelihoods, and so on. I don't want to sit from a place of privelege and pretend that I cannot see the suffering in the world. I want to care about others and have others care about me. I need to believe that most of us feel this way, deep in our kindest hearts.
I am hopeful, maybe, that the worst of this pandemic is behind us. My husband and I are fully vaccinated. One of my kids is half vaccinated. The younger child is too young to be vaccinated and so, we continue to practice extreme caution, as I am determined to get through this with all of us healthy and strong. Fortunately, where I live, case numbers are dropping quickly thanks to solid vaccination rates and continued social distancing practices. And there are many places in this state, nation and the world where the virus is still spreading, possibly mutating.
With cautious hopefulness, I am looking forward to the months ahead when my entire family is fully vaccinated and I can breathe a sigh of relief. We will probably never go back to "normal" as we remember it from 2019. All of us (whether we choose to admit it or not) have been impacted by this pandemic in ways large and small. The trick will be to look for the silver linings and feel gratitude for them.
So friends, do share your silver linings from the last year and a half. I really want to know. And, are you feeling hopeful? What are you looking forward to?
All my best,
Carolyn
