Hopes and Dreams for 2021

 

Soul Sap

“…A glare that is blindness in the early afternoon

And glow more intense than blaze of branch, or brazier

Stirs the dumb spirit: no wind, but Pentecostal fire

In the dark time of year. Between melting and freezing

The soul’s sap quivers…”

T.S. Eliot (from “Little Giddings”)

          Thus T.S. Eliot describes midwinter—the dark time of year. The precipice of a new year brings all the indecisiveness of winter weather in the Deep South. This week, temperatures will rise into the upper 60’s, but last week we were lucky to get above the 30’s. Toward the end of this week, a major storm front will bring a deluge and flooding. But who’s complaining—it’s not snow and ice, right? When I woke this morning, a dense fog blocked every view from my house; mist veiled pink puffy clouds, but now, skies are clear and blue. Here/there, up/down, cold/ hot—such is the weather, and such is our tenuous hope for the new year.

          This is another excerpt from Eliot’s collection called “Little Giddings”: “For last year’s words belong to last year’s language/ And next year’s words await another voice/ And to make an end is to make a beginning.” There are several words I would like to eliminate from the possibility of being carried into the new year. One is “nasty” applied to women who are audacious enough to speak in their own voices. Another is “hack” as it relates to new things. What does it even mean to say, “the latest hack is the iPhone 12?” I am sure you have your own irritation with our patched together language. Many of this year’s ugly words—the ones we have spewed at one another, and that have filled Twitter world—would do well to stay with 2020. They have not made our lives better—far from it.

          Sitting on the precipice of the new year, here are some hopes and dreams I have for 2021: I hope we stop disparaging others simply because they disagree with us. I hold our current president accountable for the popularity of bully-language, and I hope it leaves with him. I hope we can once again respect scholarship and science while also realizing that the language of it is complicated and may require translation. I hope that we can open our eyes and try our hardest to understand that inequality hurts us all, and then do our dead-level best to bring everyone into the fold. 2021 will be challenging enough just to get our world up and running again after the year-long shutdown. We can help by putting our weapons down, spitting out our vitriol, and adding our hands and backs to the task of rebuilding.

          I’ll bet you have some hopes and dreams for 2021. I would like to hear them. Most of all, I hope that next year will find us in good health, in good spirits, and with our soul’s sap quivering with excitement.

                                                  In the Spirit,

                                                  Jane