Every now and again I’m overwhelmed by a feeling 2020 diverged into an alternate dystopian universe. This 2020 is what it is, meanwhile, the ‘real’ 2020 is out there, nothing globally cataclysmic happening, just days going by as they were meant to. Then, this feeling subsides and while 2020 may become the year we use as a swear word, I realise that any ‘real’ 2020 is not that great either. If things were situation normal, there’s still an environmental crisis, still terrible political situations, still completely preventable war and famine and racism and sexism. So, perhaps both these 2020s are dystopian. Perhaps both are not. Perhaps, in the forthcoming Post-Covid Reconstruction Era we can remake the world into a less dystopian place.

These are, of course, big perhapses. But the universe contains multitudes, including just a little bit of hope.

Too often in my life I’m told if only you’d been here last year, yesterday, the day before…I’m always this close to an opportunity. I’ve learned, by hard repeated lessons that I miss out because my timing is at fault. I’m not there, or there but in the wrong decade. Or century. It gets tiring, being told this. It’s disheartening and, for people inclined to inform me “you would’ve won had you entered last year”, it is EXTREMELY UN-%*~^$#^*-HELPFUL. Stop telling me this, it’s not kind, it is in fact, a kind of torture.

What do I mean torture?

When I’m confronted by the alternate timeline I’m looking at another me, where different decisions and choices were made, so my circumstances, changed which in turn meant all the times I missed out, I didn’t. I made it. I got there. I won the things, I took the chances and they worked out. And this other me, living in her other 2020, is now a different person, living a vastly more successful life because of the timing. And me, this real live, struggling me is pitiful in the eyes of the more timely me.

And now, via this pandemic, the world is being invited to look at the alternate lives we could’ve have had. Everything is off, timing wise, for everyone. Plans are delayed, lives on hold, work gone or at home, or undertaken at immense risk, and of course, so many dead, sick and working hard to ensure the sick survive. Not to grandstand or anything, but, the world, in this year of bad timing, is aligning with what I’m told is my natural rhythm. Not much fun is it?

But I repeat: the universe contains multitudes, including just a little bit of hope. My timing can change and how I interpret it. In the past, the things I wanted and missed out on, eventually allowed me time to be there for others, to learn and grow, and survive. Thus, while this Covid timeline is a test, I’m still here.