‘I Can Just Be’: 20-Somethings Reflect on A Pandemic Year
Everything has changed and not enough has.
As I saw posts commemorating the “pandemic year,” I felt myself growing unsettled when it came to reflection. The COVID-19 crisis didn’t begin when it hit the United States, which means a lot of the anniversary acknowledgement seems to leave out the horrors that occurred earlier in other places. It feels premature to reflect; we’re still very much in it. I wasn’t sure how to square any reflection I might have with larger stakes, the ongoing tragedy. I wish I had a single-sentence summary of what the last year meant, but all I can come up with is: Everything has changed and not enough has.
The reflection impulse is understandable: Some research points out important parts of the reflective process, including making sense of experience, deeper honesty, clarity, and understanding. Friends posted Instagram story series, a single slide for every month of the past year, looking backward on breads they baked, people they mourned, and how significantly their lives had been altered via a means that would vanish in 24 hours. I sat, unable to find a clear-cut conclusion that wasn’t just crying, and pondered.
In the past year, I counted my blessings that my job had been remote most of the time I had it, while unpacking how I managed to come away with that luck — and…
