Happy New Year! Reasons to Appreciate 2021

 

A vintage advertisement
for Londonderry, NH Lithia Water

Well, here we are in 2021 and our annus horribilis is behind us. What can we hope for and expect in the New Year?  I know I'm looking forward to this new year with much hope.  Dwelling on the unfortunate events of 2020 is fruitless.  I'm not even going to list my usual "Best of 2020" blog posts, or photos of the past year.  Let's see what we have in store, or at least imagine it!

A dozen things I am looking forward to in 2021:

1 .    Hugs

     2.       Smiling faces (without masks)

     3.       Visiting family.  All the family. Those cousins you have not seen in years – well, 2021 is the year to drop in.  Those old aunties in nursing homes who went months without visitors.  The elderly who survived by not catching this awful virus, but missed human connections all year. The relatives you usually saw only at Christmas and Thanksgiving. They would love to see you, too. Stay in touch.

    4.       The vaccine being freely available to everyone whenever they need it.  No lines, no age limits, no qualifications.

    5.       Travel!  We cancelled nine vacations in 2020, from an 18-day Bucket List trip to South America (including a cruise through the Panama Canal), to weekends in New England.  Let’s hope it is safe in 2021 to travel, even locally.

    6.       Visiting family.  Did I say this already? 

    7.       Visiting archives, repositories, libraries, county courthouses, historical societies, etc. in person to browse for hours, no time limits, no reservations.  Ahhhh!  I can smell the books already!

    8.       Write more snail mail.  I started sending more cards in 2020. I became pen pals with my granddaughter. Why stop now?

    9.       Indoor and outdoor activities such as museums, theaters, weddings, fundraisers, conferences, board meetings, riding trains and planes, eating in restaurants, simply going somewhere without worrying about getting sick (deathly sick).  And participating in all those postponed Mayflower 400th anniversary events!  

    10.   The virtual NERGC 2021 Conference beginning 1 April 2021.  You can browse the conference brochure here:  https://39j.9e3.myftpupload.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/VIRTUAL-NERGC-2021-BROCHURE.pdf

    11.   The RootsTech conference, too, beginning 25 February 2021, which for the first time will be entirely virtual and completely free:  www.rootstech.org   (don’t forget to register ahead!)

    12.   I am looking forward to attending genealogy and local history events LIVE and IN PERSON!  I miss all my genealogy and local history friends and neighbors.

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To Link/Cite this post:  Heather Wilkinson Rojo, "Happy New Year!  Reasons to Appreciate 2021", Nutfield Genealogy, posted January 1, 2021 ( https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2021/01/happy-new-year-reasons-to-appreciate.html: accessed [access date]).