It would be simple enough to say, “well, we made it through,” and leave it at that for a holiday greeting here as the end of the longest year draws nigh. It seems likely that it will be true, though given 2020 it’s best not to count on anything – even one more week.
So we’ll take it one day at a time, which is the only way to take it in any case. I’ve tried to live two days at once and it just never works the way I imagine it will. We hope this one day finds you and yours healthy and making the best of this strange and challenging time.
Like most folks, our lives took a turn inward in mid-March. In fact, other than one “trip” to take Cheryl for a routine check-up at her doctor’s office in DC, I haven’t left the commonwealth of Virginia at all since January. I’m pretty sure that I have never spent an entire year in a single state in my life, but this one sure comes close.
Other than that doctor’s visit, Cheryl hasn’t been in DC since March. That’s a bigger deal for her than me, of course, because properly speaking that’s where she works. She hasn’t set foot in the library since March 12, though she hasn’t missed a day of work. Beats were skipped, of course, but the great pivot to the virtual world enabled her to continue connecting with teachers, creating content, and providing webinars, among many other things she does to make sure your tax dollars are well spent by her agency. There’s a lot to be said for all of this working from home but even an introvert can get too much alone time, and she does look forward to being physically present on the Hill at some point in 2021. We are hoping that the pandemic will lead to some changes on telework policies at the library, but that will have to wait for next year.
Of course, Cheryl didn’t experience much actual “alone time” at all this year because my work pivoted to the virtual world as well in mid-March. So Cheryl and I (and Mr. Bounce and Cpt. Biscuit) have been office mates for the duration. It’s definitely challenging to lead a congregation almost entirely on-line – especially when you have to figure it out overnight – but the gifted staff and leadership in the congregation where I am serving as interim head of staff have made the best of it. Over the past eight months I’ve done a couple of weddings, a couple of baptisms, a couple of memorial services, taught classes, and preached most Sunday mornings and rarely left our house for any of it. I have enjoyed the challenge and loved the people, and I kind of doubt that I’ll ever lead worship inside the building at Burke again because they are liable to have called their next installed pastor before way be clear to gather together again.
This is a family Christmas missive and not a theological reflection, so I’ll leave aside the learnings and the questions and the wonderings that have abounded through this season. But I will say it’s been a fine reminder to all that the church is not the same thing as the building, and I hope every community of faith that has remembered this truth will not forget it when they are able to gather safely again in the same place.
Gathering safely is the most important consideration for now, and that truth was driven home close to home just before Thanksgiving when Martin and Delanie both contracted Covid. Martin works in a public library that reopened to patrons over the summer and stayed open despite the increasingly dire public health situation in the Richmond area this fall. While he and Delanie were vigilant and careful, working in a facility open to the public is fraught these days. Their experience reminded us of that, and of the weird nature of this virus. Martin reports that it’s the sickest he’s ever been, and more than a month into it he still runs out of breath and energy after brief walks. Delanie, on the other hand, was pretty puny for about 10 days and seems to have recovered completely soon after that.
Despite dealing with disease, Martin and Delanie have had a pretty full year with a great deal of joy: they got married in August and bought a house in Richmond; Martin finished up his masters of library and information science; and Delanie pivoted to teaching on-line. They also participated actively in the uprising in Richmond over the summer, showing up for racial justice as often as possible as the city finally said “enough” to the monuments to the confederacy that have been a dominant feature of the local landscape since the birth of the Lost Cause narrative a century ago.
Hannah spent more than half of the year in the Richmond area, but was probably not actually in the city as often as her parents (more on that in a bit). After finishing her spring semester at UVA mostly couped up in her Charlottesville apartment taking all of her classes on line, she joined a small group of young adults living in intentional community at Camp Hanover. The crew did a huge amount of physical labor maintaining the camp and caring for its animals – goats, chickens, and ducks – while camp was closed due to Covid. They also engaged the dispersed camp community virtually leading weekly vespers services, producing social media outreach, and doing physically distanced camp-song-sing-along home visits to campers. Hannah stayed on at camp as a volunteer-in-residence all fall, working 20 hours a week for camp while taking classes on line. It’s not the senior year she imagined, for sure, but she’ll head back to her C’ville apartment next month and will graduate in May. It remains to be seen if she and her class will get to “walk the lawn,” but we’ll celebrate the accomplishment no matter what the capstone looks like in the spring. It also remains to be seen “what’s next” for her, but we’re confidant that it’ll be grand because she’s grand – a thoughtful, smart, caring young woman with a back-pack full of gifts to share with the world.
She’s greatly enjoying being aunt Hannah these days to Ollie-the-magnificent. Oh, did you forget that we became grandparents last year?
It’s safe to say that being parents of an adorable toddler has been the center of life for Bud and Monica, somewhat to the dismay of Pretzel and Pica, the two small dogs who used to occupy that place. They’ve kept a fairly tight family bubble, and we’ve been able to spend time with them both in their townhouse in Reston and at our house here in Arlington. Monica’s work, which is less than half-time for now, has returned to in-person this fall, so there’s some risk there. She works for a small non-profit that trains pets for animal-assisted therapy for children with special needs, and they’re diligent with Covid safety so we all hope for the best. Bud works for a tech company and has not been in his office in Falls Church since the pandemic began. His most recent project has been developing an app that is central to the Covid response of one New England state at the moment. Seeing the amazing grandbaby has been worth the slight risk, and taking that risk makes us acutely mindful of the incredible toll Covid has taken on so many families around the world.
Our family continues to weather the storm as well as can be. Our losses have been relatively slight: vacations cancelled, a wedding greatly reduced in scope, work lives made much more challenging, simple gatherings with friends put off indefinitely, and all the other things that most of us are compelled to give up these days.
We are grateful beyond measure for the privilege of good and continuing work, and try to leverage that privilege to support programs and policies that make the world a safer and more just place for all. While that work will, I hope and believe, continue as long as we have breath to draw, we are beginning to imagine the end of careers and the beginnings of life in retirement. Toward that end, we have bought a house in Richmond with dear friends, Clark and Mike. The house is about a century old, and has suffered decades of neglect. We’ve been living through the trials of working with a contractor 90 miles away in the midst of a pandemic, so the restoration has been a bit slower than we imagined when we closed the purchase back in January. But the end is in sight, and the house is going to be an amazing place for two aging (in place) couples to live. We won’t be down there full time for a few years to come, but when we do we hope lots of folks will come visit. The food will be fabulous, the front porch welcoming, the drinks flowing (with moderation), and the music beautiful.
All of these things and so much more are our vision of what life in the beloved community looks like. We’ll keep doing what we can to make it possible for everyone to share in that vision. These are, to be sure, difficult and dark days, but a light shines in the darkness and the darkness shall never overcome it. We’ll keep trying to lift up that light and magnify it where we are with what we’ve got so that it brings light to all.
A friend from our former church gave me a t-shirt for Christmas that says “the arc of the moral universe isn’t going to bend itself – so get involved.” Pretty much sums up what we’ve tried to do with the gifts we’ve been given. Whatever gifts you’ve been given, may they bring you and yours deep joy as you share them wherever you may be in the coming year.
Merry Christmas
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