Each year for the past few years. I’ve come up with a word for the year. Something to motivate me to move forward. This year my word is patience. If you’ve been anywhere on social media the past couple weeks, you’ve seen lots of posts celebrating the end of 2020. Of course, we all want 2020 to be over. It’s now hard to imagine that just a year ago living through a pandemic was something we read about in some science fiction novel. Now it’s become reality—a seemingly endless reality.
It’s been a hard year for me, a true optimist, glass is always half full, kind of gal. There hasn’t been much of that this year. So I am optimistic about the vaccine and getting back to “normal” sometime this coming year, but I know I still have to be patient. Even in the group I’m in, it’s likely to be another three to six months before I’ll be able to get the vaccine, then there’s the 3-4 weeks wait between two doses, and then another wait until the vaccine is effective. And then, although I’ll feel safer venturing out of my home, the general population won’t be vaccinated, so masks will still likely be a requirement. And when will big events start again? Right now, I’d consider selling my first-born child to go to a concert, football game, or just to church on Sundays.
I live alone and I miss people. I miss book signings and meeting my readers, and I’m so tired of zoom meetings. Oh, and I’m a hugger. I MISS HUGS!
So anyway, my word this year is patience. The optimist in me believes we will overcome this and return to normal life, hopefully with a little more appreciation for the little things than we had before the pandemic, but I know it’s still going to take a while and in the meantime we will all need to be patient. 2021 isn’t magically going to change anything, but we’ll get there.
Happy New Year. What’s your word for this year?
I write romances because I love happy endings. That’s one of the criteria to be a romance novel there has to be a happily ever after. Why do I like this so much? Well, I’ve always been an optimistic person, but at my day job I’m a divorce attorney. Yep. Not many happy endings in my line of work, rather I see on a daily basis love that once existed turn to bitterness and even hate. It’s sad and wrong. So I escape and write romances where happy endings do exist. Where people are loving and not hateful.