The year 2020 ended and the year 2021 has started out like no others I can recall in my lifetime. There have definitely been trying times, scary times, and events, that none of us will forget. But none of us expected that as we started 2020, like most other years, putting our plans in place for the year, vacation planning, career planning, general family and house planning, the things most do as we move from one year to another, that things were about to change in unimaginable ways.
No one saw what was coming in March when the world we knew would come to a crashing halt, how we would spend months in our homes, our work lives changed, how our children received their education changed, our health care workers worked tirelessly and under unbearable stress levels, we watched countries worldwide trying to manage the siege of the pandemic of covid 19.
We moved into summer when we became hopeful, yet apprehensive, we ventured out within our own neighborhoods and provinces a little more freely, we let out a half sigh, all the while bracing for what may still come. And come it did, fall came numbers of covid, started to climb, it seemed we had somehow become complacent about how serious the pandemic really was.
People worried about the economy, but the bigger worry was if too many get sick, and the hospitals can’t manage the load, the economy will crash anyways if people are sick they can’t work, so either we let the economy go sluggish for a time, or roll the dice with human lives.
There were and are many that have conspiracy theories about it all, but if we look to science and to the past the story is there.
I then watched as the USA, tried to navigate an election in the middle of a pandemic, we had some provincial elections here in Canada which all ran smoothly and almost seemed effortless.
I then watched as a sitting President ran amuck, created fear, and turmoil dividing a nation. I sat and watched as 2021 unfolded, a pandemic out of control, along with the President of the USA. I watched in horror as people were encouraged to fight, even though the election had been proven to be won. I watched a man whose only apparent thought was for himself and his huge ego, with total discard for the American people. I then watched as the very next day, in trying to distance himself from something he incited, he said that those who did this would be punished. I wonder if all those being arrested thought that he would come and save them, those of us watching knew he never would. He was and has been grandstanding since the election results first started to show he had lost, his ego needs to be fed, even at the cost of the country.
Please know these are fully my opinions, I don’t generally talk politics, I don’t understand how someone can jeopardize their own well being and their families for the sake of one political party or one person. I never align with any party, I listen to all and then decide who I will vote for. My way is neither right nor wrong, it does however lend itself to be thorough and thoughtful about who and what I am voting for, it is my belief political parties change along with the people in them, so I make my decisions based on who and what actions I see. So I struggle with the fact that someone would feel so compelled that they would deface and attack the very country, they say they are fighting for.
And I don’t want to get into a debate about it. Its simply me expressing my view as my heart broke and I sat and cried watching things unfold.
I had to start a meeting today, saying Politics was off the table, it was heartbreaking because I know it’s on everyone’s mind, there are some places where its acceptable our meetings aren’t, we have learned the lessons of the past, political views can be very volatile, even in the best-intended situations. Yet I knew for many it would do them the world of good to say it, let go, but doing so, could cause discord and hurt and cause members to leave due to divided views. These are not the easy moments of being the host.
My reason for writing this post is because whether we are US citizens or not, what happened the other day, impacts us all because it shows us how very fragile our own countries can be and what we believe in is. When people do not agree to disagree put stil put their differences aside because its best for the greater good or in this case the country, awful things happen.
This event along with the pandemic has shed some light on some serious issues we have in our societies regardless of where we live. I have many friends in the USA, I worry about them, I worry for them and their country and pray that going forward it can be in a way that provides room for much peace for all. I watch in our own country people who want to grandstand and sensaltionize things, to feed consipacy theories because it feeds something within themselves, without thinking or caring about whether what they are saying or doing is whats best for the greater good.
I’ve cried a good many tears through this year, for the friends who have lost loved ones, some to other things some to the pandemic, alot of losses, I’ve cried many tears for those I know who are struggling so much with all the isolation, I have cried for all those in the care homes, whose suffering we can’t imagine. I’ve cried watching the Black Lives Matter, I cried watching things unfold the other day at the capital in the US. But I also know that I live with alot of hope, that things will improve and maybe we will come out with a better world for us all.
I hope for all of us the pandemic has taught us that we need less, that material things are of little value, but relationships are the most valuable, that we must take care of each other, do a better job of taking care of our seniors, of our earth and of each other.
As the next few weeks unfold we will all be watching in hopes that all that has happened in the US can end with a new era being brought in, with healing and peace prevailing. Yes 2021 has started out with some of the worse of what we would ever want to see, but their is hope, their is light, if we remember to be grateful to be kind.
Chrissy's Journey 