For so many, 2020 has been a year you would rather forget. No, it is a year to remember.
Our lives teach us all is not harmony. Life is about finding melody in the chaos. You learn that pain is something you do not get over, but you get through.
In life, there is loss. In loss, there is learning. But there is no dark night not followed by a bright sun.
The spirit of the holidays shines greater than any pandemic. It is a reminder of how special our friends and family are, how a season of cheer can give rise to a spring of hope.
Our nation’s state of health will get better with the distribution of vaccines we should all take. No one likes a shot, but as global remedies go, this is one of the best.
The worst part of the international health emergency is that the Trump Administration consciously and deliberately played down the dangers we faced. We could have risen up as a nation together. He tore us down and divided us instead. Our country has paid the price with more deaths on our own shores than anywhere else in the world.
On Nov. 3, the president paid a political price for his hostility and harm. He was not re-elected. He lost in a landslide, not only by seven million votes, but 75 electoral ones.
It’s not the subject of this editorial, but Trump’s legal challenges and personal tirades since his loss are the cries of a sore loser who was never capable of handling the tasks of the office.
It’s amazing our country has survived Donald Trump’s administrative ineptitude, personal immaturity, and professional irresponsibility. But we are not there yet, are we? The reign of Captain Chaos won't come to an end until the afternoon of January 20, 2021.
Expect some congressional turbulence on Jan. 6 and 7, but our country will weather it. You will be witnessing the constitutional process play itself out.
As we celebrate a new life and political birth, remember that the virus will not magically go away because the calendar turns to a new year on Jan. 1.
You have seen too often how athletes who hold up a football before they cross the goal line find themselves tackled before they get there. Don’t make that same mistake as you celebrate the holidays and New Year with your loved ones.
Remain responsible, be socially distant, avoid large crowds in small places, and remember, the fat lady has not sung yet. Wear your freaking mask.
Be not reckless. For all our strengths, we have limitations and boundaries. Like pandemics, they can be overcome and conquered if we are cautious and conscientious.
Life will become richer and our community stronger if we responsibly reckon with Reason and Science.
We have built amazing skyscrapers and placed men on the moon. We have built steel machines that fly across oceans and majestic ships that can sail upon them. Still, we are learning in this 21st century, are we not? Nature has a few forces we must continue to respect.
The pandemic that separates the world today will bring us all closer tomorrow. We will appreciate even more the universality and shared a partnership of mankind.
We are all immigrants in a culture of biodiversity and expansion, not constriction and exclusion. World peace may be closer than we ever thought. An intercontinental calamity can remind us of how much we all have in common.
For those that have lost, and so many of us have, may yesterday’s memories illuminate your tomorrows.
This year, in the face of an apocalypse of adversity, hopefully we have learned this is a time not to complain about what is not there, but rather to appreciate what we have right around us.
Happy Holidays from SFGN.
