2020: The Year of the Blur
2020 Monthly Portraits (Click to photo to enlarge)
2020 Favorites
Favorite Movie I Watched in 2020: National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation (1989)
Favorite Collectible Purchase: Super7 Snoopy Daisy Hill Farms
Favorite Songs of 2020: Mood – 24kGoldn feat. Iann dior, Laugh Now, Cry Later – Drake feat. Lil’ Durk, Believe It – Partynextdoor feat. Rihanna, I’m not superman – fiction. feat. Jahkoy
Favorite Album of 2020: Man on the Moon III: The Chosen / Funeral – Lil’ Wayne
Favorite Mixtape of 2020: No Ceilings 3 – Lil’ Wayne
Favorite Shoe Release of 2020: Kobe V Protro 5 Rings
When I look back on 2020, I think I’ll remember more about the world than myself. 2020 has been a blur, a blur of colors I don’t have the perspective yet to make beauty out of. It’s somewhere in there, I know it is. I just haven’t found it yet. Maybe these things come with age, maybe they come with experience. 2020 was a reminder that change is imminent, and life is precious. Because of the day to day routine, we rarely sit back and think of how different things are despite the feeling of monotony we’ve grown to be familiar with. When life feels dormant, or when I feel aimless, I revert to a chimerical affair I wish was real. I think to myself, if I were a time traveler and I were to go back and tell a 14-year-old me about life currently, what would I tell him? The metric in which I judge the change in life at the moment is based on the hypothetical reaction a teenage version of myself would have. Sometimes it’s scary, sometimes it’s comforting, but regardless, it lets me know life is moving no matter the stillness I may feel.
So, let’s say I’m back in 2007, where should I begin our conversation? Well at the top the year, one of your childhood idols will pass away in a helicopter crash on the way to coach his daughter’s basketball team. Kobe will also have been retired since 2016. Philip Rivers would part ways with the Chargers, landing as an Indianapolis Colt. He’s still playing at a high level though. Also, the Chargers aren’t in San Diego anymore, they will share a newly built 5-billion-dollar stadium with the Rams which is set to open in the fall of 2020. I know the Rams are St. Louis’ team, but trust me, they’ll be back in LA with the Chargers. Speaking of the Chargers, in February of 2020 you’d see Coach Schottenheimer at a nursing home you volunteered at that specialized in taking care of patients with dementia. In Charlotte of all places? I get it, mad random. You’ll notice him while you are being given a tour of the place, but it isn’t until he sits down to watch a gameshow from the 70’s in a common area that you’ll realize who he is. You’ll still be mad they fired him after a 14-2 season, especially because Philip still hasn’t even been to a Superbowl. Also, LeBron will lead the Lakers to a championship in a bubble built specifically for NBA players as we are in a pandemic. LeBron on the Lakers? I know, it sounds crazy, but trust me it’s gonna happen. There will also be a virus that came from China that’ll change the expectations of society norms. Don’t worry too much though, as the virus will have a 99.5% recovery rate. Just take the necessary precautions. Your anxiety will hit you around the summer of 2012, but that’s neither here nor there. People will walk around with masks and businesses will be forced to shut down early, so no more 2am Walmart trips for the time-being.
Hm, what else?
You’ll start collecting sneakers again. All the shoes you want currently that you can’t get, you will go back and get in 2020. NFL games will be played in mostly empty stadiums. Bagel, your dog and the most important being to you, will begin to have problems this year. You’ll spend the whole summer going in and out the vet. So far, nothing too serious, just an elevated liver ALT value and an occasional disk slippage. I know you are indifferent about animals now, because all Mom and Dad have allowed you to have growing up was beta fish, but trust, you will grow into the biggest animal lover there is. In fact, while taking Bagel out one chilly October night during the year of 2020, you’ll notice an opossum resting near the house. You’ll do research on opossums, find out they don’t have much fur which causes them to get cold, so they sleep by houses in the winter. You’ll end up buying food to feed him. Then after a week or so you’ll begin noticing more opossums, a white and grey cat, a fat orange cat, and a slim orange cat coming to the back patio for food. You’ll also discover a nest of kits in the backyard by accident a couple of weeks earlier. Kits are baby bunnies, remember that for a biology exam you’ll probably have in the next year or so. Also, in regard to biology, you’ll finally graduate UNCC in May of 2020 with your bachelor’s degree. You’ll feel lost but napping with Bagel will keep you grounded. Sebastian’s (yes Salazar, but his last name will change and I’ll let him tell you why when the time comes) brother will open up a meal prep company called Get Fit Foods, which is where you will work. You’ll spend your days there writing. You’ll even learn to solve a Rubik’s cube you’ve been putting off since 2016, in 2020. I think that is it for now. I have to finish packing, because I (we) are getting an opportunity to work with Dad starting mid-January 2021 to not only fatten our pockets big time, but to gain some experience in order to apply to grad school. And I (you) am currently missing the city we’ve felt stuck in for the past few years or so. I don’t know what I’m feeling, but I will write about it, as you should, too.
One more thing, people in this country will get so divided in the year 2020. Just continue to do you. Always show love, always practice acceptance, and always exhibit patience with the goal of understanding. If people judge you, so be it, just remember not to return the favor.
Be good, stay positive, take some more risks, and enjoy the moment because sometimes life will feel like a blur.
And when it does, reach back out to me because I’ll fill you in on how much things have changed.