The cover story: 2020 tested us beyond measure. Where do we go from here?

The Cover Story 2020 Tested Us Beyond Measure. Where Do We Go From Here? By Stephanie Zacharek Film Critic, TIME When I got the assignment to look back on the whole messy tragedy of 2020 as if it were a movie, I barely knew where to start. Even February, before we had any idea how radically our lives were going to change, could easily have belonged to another decade. So I started by looking back to the beginning of the worst, which was, for me and for many New Yorkers, the end of March through mid-April. At that point, COVID-19 cases in New York City were rising by the hour. It was nightmarish to see news photos of refrigerated trucks on the streets of Manhattan, set up to accommodate the predicted overflow of corpses. There was so much suffering all around: even if you were lucky enough to be working, watching people line up at food banks to feed their families—when, just weeks before, they'd been doing OK—meant that the world had undergone a sudden, devastating shift. The isolation of being in lockdown only intensified the despair. There were occasional flashes of hope: the Black Lives Matter protests of the summer represented at least one step toward positive change. Yet the broader picture of death and anguish, escalating not just nationwide but worldwide, was inescapable. And for all of 2020, the American political arena was impossible to fathom, a mirror world where outright lies were accepted by many as truth. But even then, I wasn't sure how to shape an essay around the idea of helplessness—it was too amorphous to get a hold of. Then my editor on the piece, Kelly Conniff, reminded me of some of the things she and I had talked about in casual email conversations over the summer: Being grateful for the pleasure of taking a walk outside, or of looking ahead to a sunny weekend, or having a new movie to watch. Writing is so different from actually living! And in writing, I had been so focused on helplessness and despair that I had actually forgotten the little tricks I had used on myself to try to get through it all. A good editor can remind you of seemingly inconsequential things that actually mean the world. You'll have your own versions of those things. They're all worth hanging onto. Read the Story » Share the cover story

Want more from TIME? Sign up for our other newsletters. Subscribe to the magazine.

TIME may receive compensation for some links to products and services in this email. Offers may be subject to change without notice.   Connect with TIME via Facebook | Twitter | Newsletters   *UPDATE EMAIL     *UNSUBSCRIBE    PRIVACY POLICY   YOUR CALIFORNIA PRIVACY RIGHTS   TIME Customer Service, P.O. Box 37508, Boone, IA 50037-0508   Questions? Contact newsletters@time.com   Copyright © 2021 TIME USA, LLC. All rights reserved. Subscription Information This email was sent to Webmaster220 Bible Study Blog *the blog owner has deleted the hyperlink intentionally