At midnight, people in my condo cult de sac, stood on their balconies and cheered, shouted ‘Happy New Year’ and fireworks across the water went off.
I cried.
Such a feeling of relief, a sigh, a hope, a belief that we had made it through a year of unimagined days.
It was not a ‘hard’ year for me, I am an Ambivert – and the introvert part of me was perfectly happy staying at home, creating, hiking, not feeling the pressure of having to be social.
The shocking part of 2020 for me was that I had anxiety, anxiety about the future, the future of everyone, the unknowing.
These people, who I had stood across from, on our decks and clapped at 7 pm for our essential workers, saw each other for the first time in a way I had not for over the 10 years I have lived in my condo.
It is at midnight on the changing from 2020 to 2021 that I feel a collective release, a sigh of letting go, a cheer of hope and it made me cry; a cry for the grace I have learned to embrace in hindsight of 2020.
As a noun, respair means “the return of hope after a period of despair.” As a verb, respair means “to have hope again.” Although both forms are rare and obsolete, they seem ripe for reviving.
Happy New Year 2021