Last night, I ate an entire bag of *Limited Edition* Private Selection Cranberry Bourbon Pecans while I listened to an hourlong audio of a sitting President trying to coerce the Secretary of State of Georgia to “find” 11,780 votes…during a pandemic. Then, at some point, I used my incentive spirometer to give my lungs a bit of exercise, because my lungs are crap-tastic on the best of days, struggled to lift the first ball into the air, and thought to myself, “This is my new normal. When did any of this become normal on a Sunday night?”
And yet…I’m F.I.N.E. Mostly in the Louise Penny definition of the word, fine. But still, fine.
Hubby, Kiddo, and I have been in good health, or at least not in WORSE health than our pre-pandemic selves. To my knowledge, none of us have been exposed to the COVID-19 virus, although we know MANY people who have not been as fortunate.
I think 2020 taught me to embrace: “Don’t believe everything you think,” on another level. In fact for me, ALL of 2020 seemed to be a lesson in questioning my belief systems, to not be so rigid, to stretch my critical thinking muscles. I spent much of last year buried in non-fiction, going down various rabbit holes of information. Looking at things I thought I knew to be true and asking myself, “What if the opposite were true? What would that look like? What do I REALLY know for sure? How can I find out more?”
In a weird way, 2020 was a lesson in accepting the limited amount of time I have on left Earth. Not in a morbid, pessimistic way. I’d rather believe that if my life were a Three Act book, movie, or play, I’m living in the Second Act. Plenty of rising action and antagonism!
That said, I’ve been asking myself, “What’s important right now?”
- Something frivolous like worrying about my current dress size. Or…
- Being on the right side of history, even when it’s stressful to do so.
So if you’ve been following me on Twitter, and it seems as though I’ve become more vocal, rest assured it’s been a surprise for me, too! I am an introvert at heart. I never thought I would be brave enough to be a public ally for the LGBTQ+ community, or the kind of person who denounces voter suppression, who promotes “Black Lives Matter.” It’s not as though I didn’t believe in these things, before 2020. It’s that I used to believe that my voice didn’t matter. Who would listen to me? Why do I matter?
And yet, going public with my personal beliefs has also become my new normal in 2021. Perhaps I am braver than I think.
xo Juli
JULI HOFFMAN 