It is October 2020 and I Have to Wonder, Where Did the Year Go?
Almost election day and it seems like yesterday was a lifetime ago
I know it is said that time flies, but this year it seems as if it stopped after the New Year’s Eve celebration. What happened to Valentine’s Day, with the long-stem roses, chocolates and the romantic evenings out?
Did St. Patrick’s Day with its drunken celebrations and green beer ever happen? Did happy children run through the grass searching for the hidden Easter eggs after family dinners? And what of spring break with its parties and trips to the beach, flights to Cancun, Aruba or other exotic locales for those who could afford such things?
Did those things happen but no one noticed?
The Mother’s Day visits that passed us by, the Memorial Day start of beach season, the happy graduation ceremonies that never came, the summer vacations and backyard cookouts, the family reunions, the Fourth of July firework displays, the back-to-school shopping, the end of summer last-weekend-at-the-beach Labor Day trips.
Did those things happen but no one noticed?
What happened to the time? It seems like we missed the entire year. Shut into our homes with nowhere to go even if it had been safe is what happened. That uncontrolled corona virus that causes COVID is what happened.
The virus that our President, who swore an oath to protect and defend us from all threats, foreign and domestic, took no action to control or even slow its spread.
The threat to our nation that our President was informed of in November 2019 and warned of the imminent danger to the US in January 2020.
The virus he openly admitted in March, just not to the public, that he knew would be “bad, many times worse than the worst flu ever, transmittable through the air and highly contagious” is what happened.
The pandemic that our President, the nation’s putative leader, took “no responsibility for”, called it a Democratic hoax designed to hurt him politically is what happened. Then it was a Chinese hoax in collusion with the Democrats to hurt him politically. Then it was the “China” virus.
The fast spreading virus the President “took no responsibility for” failing to take any action to control. That is what happened.
No need to worry, nothing to see here, our leader assured us in March, it will be gone by Easter, but it was not. When the weather warms in April, it will be it will go away, but it did not. But it will be gone, like magic, one day you will wake up and it will just be gone. Instead, it grew worse by the day.
But pay no attention to that virus, it is no worse than a flu and it is under control. Just look at the Stock Market, it is doing great, the economy has never been better.
Ignore the fact that the economy is not the Stock Market, nor is the Dow Jones average. And ignore the twenty-nine million jobs lost by April and the fifty-eight thousand dead Americans whose families could not even honor with a burial service.
And the empty chairs that would have been around many tables at Easter or Mother’s Day dinners if those holidays could have been celebrated.
And the countless people who could not even visit their mothers on Mother’s Day. And worse, the people whose mothers were hospitalized with COVID and they could not even be in the same room them as they watched from a distance suffer and die.
So many people had loved ones who contracted the virus and suffered with COVID. But our President “took no responsibility” and the economy is doing great. I am sure that provided them great comfort as they watched their loved ones suffer and die alone, without so much as a simple touch.
And the high school and college graduations that never took place, depriving students of what they had worked so hard to attain.
Professional sports events cancelled or rescheduled for 2021 or 2022, the concerts cancelled, restaurants, bars, and movie theaters closed, the beaches closed, and limits placed on outdoor gatherings.
The holidays, rather than being times of joy and happiness and family gatherings were, like every other day of the year, passed in seclusion. Home-delivery and curbside pickup became the new norm. Amazon deliveries became ubiquitous.
This year is a Presidential election year, always important but the 2020 election is considered by many to be the most impactful election in our nation’s history.
Even before the pandemic, America faced mass protests, riots, white supremacists’ violence against state governments, attempted kidnapping and execution of Governors and unjustified police killings of Black Americans.
And a President who had teargas and rubber bullets used on peaceful protestors so that he could walk across the street and hold a Bible upside down for a photo op, the acts of an autocrat who deliberately divides the population and electorate.
The election will take place during some of the most difficult challenges America has faced since the Civil War, a choice of two paths for our future, and voter participation was expected to be at record high levels. As was voter suppression.
Voting during a pandemic, especially when the political Party in power is doing everything possible to suppress the vote, makes it more important, and more difficult, than ever to have a fair, honest election.
And despite the suppression of votes, the voter roll purges, court challenges, deliberate slowing of the mail service and drastic reduction of polling places, citizens still spend hours, sometimes the entire day, standing in the heat or the rain in slow-moving, socially distanced lines to cast their votes early.
Election Day is one date that cannot be changed, and more Americans than ever see this year’s election to be critical to our future as a nation. Do we continue our descent in a chaotic, violent race-divided autocracy run by the privileged few or do we fight for a fairer, more equitable society for all?
And that is where the time went, it was quarantined, and with it the holidays, birthdays, and special occasions of 2020.
Any factual claims made herein have been addressed in earlier stories I’ve published on Medium, Illumination, and Illumination Curated.
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