Saturday, January 2, 2021

Year-End Letter - Pandemic Edition

This year we did not send the usual Christmas card.  Instead I made a simple card that contained our year-end letter which T and I signed.  The letter and card were simple - reflecting the life we all had during the year in review 2020.

Eucalyptus: The illustration used on our card this year.
  

December 25, 2020

Dear Relatives and Friends --

To say that 2020 is a different year is both an understatement and a cliché. And yet in spite of the sudden shift in the way we lived due to the pandemic, life in 2020 was mostly ordinary. Tim and I celebrated our 29th wedding anniversary early in the year. When the shelter- in-place was imposed, our children were in different places: Shannon in Madison, Wisconsin; Brahms in Arcata, Humboldt County; and Miriam in Davis, Yolo County.

Most significant this year
Miriam: Participated in an hour long performance of the Steve Reich piece “Music for 18 Musicians”.
Brahms: Got my teaching credential and moved to Redding for teaching job.
Shannon: Bought a house.
Helen: Got my Certificate in Botanical Art from Filoli.
Tim: Lived with Helen 24x7 at home.

Weirdest this year
Tim: Enrolled in a college class.
Shannon: Got into volleyball for a couple of months
Miriam: Had a month where I was fixated on learning everything about the Zodiac Killer.
Helen: Raised chickens
Brahms: Spur of the moment trip to Portland and Seattle.

Learned in the Pandemic
Brahms: Sometimes you need to be the person reminding others of the seriousness of the issue. Other times you need to be the person assuring others that everything will be okay, and sometimes you just need someone to remind you of these things.
Shannon: Plague horror movies weren’t wrong in depicting lots of people breaking quarantine and failing to take the disease seriously.
Miriam: I learned to let go.
Helen: Learned to make artisan breads using my own yeast culture.
Tim: Learned to grow and enjoy dahlias.

We hope that the resilience and grace we practiced in 2020 has made us all better people to face what 2021 brings.

Best Wishes for 2021

From the Lewis Family


No comments:

Post a Comment

Leave a Response