The year that robbed us of all, but patience and perseverance.
Rewind to 2020.
Photo by Artem Podrez on Pexels.com
Our generation had a lot to balance and we would often find ourselves at loggerheads with time, fighting to break-even with our careers and relationships. Not to forget, we couldn’t even strike the right cord with our own beliefs, amongst several other imperfections we never admitted to. Sadly, Demand and Supply never really intersected at an equilibrium, they usually did at a point of discontentment, unhappiness and disappointment. We would often find ourselves racing against time, demands of unknown unknowns more often than not, surpassing the supply of known knowns.
While all of this was at play, the universe played its cards.
Came the pandemic, and the year 2020 was the teacher who would spank us for being irresponsible towards people who mattered to us; towards the one life, we have and we forget to cherish. After all, the gratitude that we often don’t feel, for the breaths that we take, could easily be passed as the saddest expression for our generation and the ones to come.
While it may have been a debacle for the world economy, it was a whistleblower for most of us. Let’s admit that. The generation we all had become, we did need this blow. It was a blow- a real hard one. More than the physical nuances of the upheaval, this pandemic threw psychological boomerangs at us. Yes, they were boomerangs, after all we reaped what we sowed.
Personally for me, it marked a lot of my firsts, my first flowerbed, the first time I tendered to our kitchen garden, the first time I tried my hand at baking, my first indoor sport purchase, the first time I got to spend a mammoth time with my children of 15 years, my first attempt at trying to make desserts at home, albeit lame, that I could neither gather courage to try, nor had time to experiment otherwise. For the first time, I took a retreat from Social Media for good. I finished penning my first ever book that I started good 6 years back. I had been way too busy to have enjoyed these simple pleasures of life. This year also quietly rekindled the love that tacitly had laid at rest. Never in my life I had picked up the phone to call my parents as many times as I did this year. The story of my children and me, was no different. This year, I, for the first time, got an opportunity to recuperate for the loss of time I couldn’t spend with them when they were growing up. All of this while managing work calls, spreadsheets, Review Meetings and project delivery timelines.
I am indebted to 2020.
But it was also the first time I felt the pain of losing someone who was a father to me, a pure soul, a kind hearted man who hid Christmas gifts under my pillow for years. My father in law who was never an ‘in-law’. It was the first time I ever saw someone taking his last few breaths. It was the first time I felt a hollow with his fond remembrances connected to every nook and corner around. All said and done, passing-aways take much more than what they give.
For all the relationships that became just ‘relations’ in wake of being taken for granted, I apologize. And all those who took me for granted, I forgive. A Thank you to the people who came in my life, and walked away, I am sure you had come for a reason. For all the friends that stuck, we are together for life; we are going to go a long way.
It is time to retrospect, pause, slow down and restart. The going can be tougher, but in a little corner of my heart, I quietly nurse an undying hope for 2021 to be kinder and forgiving.