Anticipating the Best after Quite an Unusual Year

Photo Credit: https://unsplash.com/photos/jNs

Welcoming the New Year in the Philippines was always accompanied by such a level of fireworks display that particles, toxins, chemicals, and smoke linger in the air and litter the streets for hours and days afterward. But this year will probably not be the same. It is not an ordinary passing of the old and welcoming of the new.

First of all, 2020 was so unusual. It featured both a once-a-lifetime pandemic and the most consequential and most controversial US election in history. But there are also great reasons to celebrate, albeit with less noise and debris. There is a realization that we have all been touched by something larger than ourselves. And the new normal consists of being more aware of the ABCs of life, the authentic, the basic, and the core. 

Health and Medicine

We were supposed to be on a plane for our annual all-inclusive vacation at a Mexican resort. When we booked this, we were not being reckless. At 76 and 72, we just realized that we had so little time left. But we just found out that we have been prioritized in the Covid-19 vaccine distribution plan, after the frontline healthcare workers and those in long-term care facilities in Phase 1a. Bill is included in Phase 1b, 75 year-olds and frontline essential workers, and I am in Phase 1c, 64-75 year-olds and those with high-risk health conditions. Both should be completed in the first quarter of the new year. This, together with the advances in therapeutics that were also achieved in 2020, should be great reasons to celebrate.

my favorite mask from UPAAA

 We want to receive the vaccines at the earliest available time. So we canceled our Mexican vacation and moved the trip to November-December 2021, dovetailing with our 2022 winter break, finally giving Bill his dream of staying there longer!

We are also celebrating the awesome fact that we made it to this point. We have remained Covid-free and our immune systems have stayed okay. We exercise daily, and the food we eat has always been carefully chosen. We have even added zinc, extra vitamin C, and increased fluid intake to our daily regimen. And we have  faithfully followed the science (please see Today's New Normal for Continuing to Travel Safely) to decrease the probability of an infection.

Being with Family and Friends

I also celebrate having in my safe bubble my husband of twelve and a half years. We are great partners in domestic chores and other tasks. Zoom has been our platform of choice for being with others in our circle of family and friends. As a matter of fact, we upgraded to Zoom Pro and expect it still to be handy in 2021. That is because it will take some time before society will get to herd immunity (some say when 85% have been vaccinated) so we will continue following the science through most of the new year. 

We  celebrate the fact that, beginning September or October, we may be able to resume being with family and friends we were not able to see this year. Hopefully, the US/Canada border will reopen so I can see my daughter and her family in Calgary. We also pray that flights and airports will become safer so we can visit Bill’s daughter in Anchorage. We have scheduled our going to my daughter in Melbourne to 2022. The April wedding of my first Apo in Los Angeles has been moved to October 2021. And, later that month, we hope to be in Las Vegas for the biennial Grand Reunion and Convention of the UP Alumni Association in America.

My Induction at the 2019 Grand Reunion and Convention 2019

Economy

The elections were quite traumatic for the majority of Americans. And, by the looks of it, healing will not come any time soon. My best hopes are that the economy recovers more consistently, that most everybody will regain the jobs they lost and revive their businesses that were temporarily disrupted, and that we will soon see the last of the stimulus checks.

I also pray that the Republicans will win the two Senate seats in the Georgia run-off elections so that the system of checks and balances will remain securely in place. This will ensure that we do not have drastic policy changes while we are still under the delicate processes of economic recovery from the pandemic.

signing the books for a shipment to Manila

In other words, I welcome the new year with wide-open arms, embracing the new awareness of our health, impending reunions with loved ones, and the resurgence of our economy. I also selectively turn my back on the year just passed. After all, it was the year I was given the time to write and publish my second travel book, Cruising Past Seventy, when medicine advanced, and when most everyone came to realize what is truly most important in one's life.  

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