2020 - The Year We All Stayed Home

 I usually write a year end blog on New Years Day.  I have been thinking about what I wanted to say about 2020.   I went back and reread my year end blogs from 2019, 2018, and 2017.   I noticed that each of those years I started out by saying this has not been one of my best years.  And I ended each blog saying I was sure the new year would be better.   This year I just don't know what to say.   So I think this photo taken in Meredith, New Hampshire is the best way to start.  What a long strange trip it's been.  

Last years blog said we were already planning travel for February 2020.   Well that didn't happen.  Mark did buy his new car in February.

 And we did take a road trip to Odessa, Delaware where we went to a restaurant for the last time without a mask.  Also with the new car we went to Woodland Beach, Delaware.  That's a place I had not been since I was five years old when my family rented a boat and went crabbing in the Delaware Bay.  The high lights of Woodland Beach were my photos of a lone house on the beach...

..and a nuclear reactor on the New Jersey shore across the Delaware Bay.  When I edited my photo of the reactor to a black and white image there was a spooky blue haze all around it like radiation coming out of it.   Oh 2020 this was just my first surprise of the year.

We started hoarding toilet paper, stocking up a two week supply of emergency groceries and hunting for masks to wear next.    While doing this we got the word from my daughter Danielle that she had been hired for a job in Boston,  She had been unemployed for most of 2019.   She and her wife ended up selling their house in Atlanta, packing up a rental van and moving to Boston right at the heart of the original quarantine.  List this under things to stress out Dad.  Just as Danielle was preparing to move my other daughter Katie was diagnosed with Crohn's disease.  She was hospitalized and of course we were not allowed to visit.   Another item to add to the list of  things to stress out Dad.   We did go the hospital parking lot and wave to Katie's window.  You can see Katie in the window above.   I will not be embarrassed to say I cried on the way home. 

So what is next to add to the list of things to stress out Dad.  After leaving the hospital Katie was told due to Covid and budgetary issues she was being let go from her job.  Perfect timing.  Just what a person with a major medical diagnosis needs.  No health insurance.  Lots of prayers were said.  That's one thing 2020 has done.  It has increased my prayer life triple fold.  And within a couple of weeks Katie was offered a temporary job in New Hampshire!  The company provided her with a beautiful log cabin on isolated dirt road with a view of  Mt Washington in her back yard.  

I was a bit concerned when she accepted the job.  The idea of her just being diagnosed with Crohn's disease and moving to an isolated cabin on a dirt road in New Hampshire was definitely another item on the things to stress out Dad list.  She had to drive up for an initial interview and introduction to the new company.   I did not want her to drive from Baltimore to Lancaster, New Hampshire by herself so I drove up with her.  We were booked into a resort that had been closed for twelve weeks.  We were one of a handful of guests there for opening weekend.  Other than one or two other people were were the only guests in a 180 room resort.  I will say in the midst of a world wide pandemic with quarantining all around this was a wonderful escape for three days.  

I wanted to be trendy and follow the big fashion statement of 2020, a Covid beard.  I had never grown a beard before and I have to admit I liked having one.  I still have it to start out the new year 2021.  Add this to the list of things to stress out your husband.

We were able to visit Katie in New Hampshire later this summer and also spend a day in Boston with Danielle and Andrea.  It was a bit tricky going to Boston.  Massachusetts had a ban on visitors from Maryland due to Covid that came with a healthy fine if you tried to spend the night there.  We did drive to Danielle's house and drove with her to see some of the sites in Boston but that was the best we could do under the circumstances.  

2020 continued to haunt us the rest of the year.  Everyone has been affected by 2020 no matter who they are.  It was no respecter of persons.  I had friends who died.  Friends who were very sick.  And our beloved dog Delilah died this year.  She was fourteen years old and had health issues.   We did get to take her to New Hampshire before she died and she loved the cabin and the huge fields around it.  She died November 8, 2020.   We had a vet come to the house and we said our goodbyes on the back deck of our house.   

We were lost without her and knew we wanted another dog to fill the void as soon as possible.  We found Tallulah just a few weeks later from a rescue site.  We drove to central Pennsylvania to pick her and bring her home.  

But 2020 was not finished with our home yet. Two days before Christmas Tallulah darted out of our house and was hit by a car.  We thought she was gone for good.   Once again many prayers were said and out faith was tested but she survived.   She had a dislodged shoulder and a multi fractured leg below the shoulder.  There was concern this 18 month old pup would have to have her leg amputated.  But as of New Years Day she is recuperating at home and her leg has been saved.   We will have eight weeks of recovery and hopefully the leg will heal properly.

As I said in the beginning "What A Long Strange Trip It's Been".   2020 is a year no one living now will ever forget.   This truly has been one of the worst years of our lives.   But my girls both have jobs.  They both had adventures moving to New England during the pandemic.  Mark's mother had Covid while in assisted living and recovered but sadly is fading from Alzheimer's every single day.  Our dog survived.   We have toilet paper.  And as a family we all have each other.  

What is my final image of 2020?  This about sums it up.  A dirty mask left on a table in Littleton, New Hampshire.  I'll this year here at the table.