A Year Later

We took advantage of our time home together to a have a family photo session.

Our spring break is here and like so much of the world, we are remembering the start of our shut-down and jolting shift of life that began one year ago.  I feel a little crazy, because I wish I could go back and enjoy that period of life when we were all home again.  

I would stay home from work longer and spend more one-on-one time with each of my children.  I would paint several room in our home.  I would work plant more perennial flowers that would be blooming today.  I would truly organize my basement.  

I would spend more time sitting with our girls who now have homes of their own, but returned for extended time at our place.  I would make the drive to visit family, even though it might have been considered dangerous.  

Today life feels more intense, and there are more pressures.  Our young adult children have returned to the lives they have cultivated in towns far from home.  We now have three teens living at home and their independence is growing each day, it seems.  I miss the sense of togetherness that was forged when we were all bound to one another every moment by the restrictions of the initial quarantine.

I miss the slower pace that life demanded back then.  The last year has been full of  shocking changes.  The sweep cancellations of so many events and gatherings.  The rhythm of life is forever changed, I think.  The ability for mandates and imposed restrictions is now a precedent which will be enacted more and more, I fear.  

I have personally known some who succumbed to Covid.  We have faced the illness in our home.  I have grieved with close friends that lost a parent or grandparent.  It has been a heavy time.

That heaviness seems to be lightening somewhat and it is with hope and endurance that we all move forward.  We have a few road trips scheduled.  Our church is meeting regularly and the kids are back in school each day.  Life is altered, but more regular now.