I am admittedly writing this year reflection during the summer of 2022 so my feelings toward 2020 may come across as more optimistic and enduring than they originally were.

Regardless, what do I even say about 2020. It was a year of growth amidst stagnancy. It was a year of “unforeseen” circumstances as if every other occurrence is easily predictable. It was a year where I unconsciously began a transformation into someone real and someone I liked to be.

I remember the day that every stopped so clearly it’s a little astonishing. It was March 13, 2020, the last weekday of Spring Break during my junior high school year. I was at my friend Sofie’s house with a few other friends and we were just fucking around Mill Ave and making jokes about how we hoped school would get canceled so we wouldn’t have to take the SAT on March 14th. I remember the excitement that ran through me when I heard I didn’t have to wake up at 6am the next day anymore to drive to a random school and take a 5-hour long test.

That initial naivety is something I think back on a lot. If only I could see a second of six months into the future where my dad and I would eat dinner with my mom over FaceTime as she quarantined herself after working in the hospital every day. Maybe I wouldn’t have been so eager for school to get canceled if I knew that I would never get to go to the prom I had planned for two and a half years. Maybe I would’ve felt more anxiety if I knew that I would slip into increasingly overwhelming symptoms of bipolar disorder.

Honestly, who knows what I would’ve felt if I knew everything that was about to follow? I probably would’ve been institutionalized for a period of time for having a mental breakdown. That’s probably the biggest thing I think about when looking at 2020: my mindset. I was so up-tight all the damn time and never allowed myself to actually live my life. I felt invalidated in almost every aspect of my life due to my own self-doubt and nonexistent self-esteem. I wasn’t authentic and genuine as much as I prided myself on being my truest self.

I hate the concept of being ‘grateful’ for the pandemic because, despite the growth I have experienced and the love I am finally creating for myself, none of that is worth the pain and loss millions of people experienced across the globe.

2020 was a year of beginnings for me, I started this website and I started to maybe think I could be happy and content in life.