I have written one of these posts for nearly every year I have been blogging. It is a chance to look back on the year. I wasn't sure if I wanted to write one this year, but it feels more important than ever to reflect on the weird year that was 2020. I have broken this down into three sections- university, personal and reading/writing/culture.
University
In the first half of 2020, I completed my second year of university. It was odd completing it at home, after having to leave suddenly. I haven't seen some of my friends in months. I'm still proud of the work I managed to achieve as I really struggled with motivation this year. I got a slightly better grade than last year and I'm hoping graduate with a good grade this year. Then in the second half of 2020, I started my third and final year of university. It is bizarre to me that I will be graduating in six months time. It's a cliche to say, but it does feel as though I only started university yesterday. Moving everything online has been a weird experience. I miss the separation between home and uni. Now that I'm on Christmas break, I have been enjoying the work a bit more as I feel I've had time to relax and brainstorm. I'm ready to graduate and move away from education, even though I don't have a plan for what to do next.
Personal
Even without COVID, 2020 was a fairly difficult year for me personally. The first 5-6 weeks were amazing. I was having a great time. Then in early February, I fell ill with a mystery illness. It was a scary moment as I had never had something like that happen to me. I haven't totally recovered, but I am a lot better than February. It goes without saying but this impacted my year a lot. In the last eighteen months, I have experienced some of the worst health points in my life. At the end of the day, I'm still alive, even if I'm not in the best of health, but it could have been so much worse.
A few months ago, I saw tweets going around asking people what had they achieved in this awful year. At first, my thought was "well I haven't achieved anything". I had so many goals. I was going to travel and work. None of that happened. It made me a bit sad to see that a lot of people had achieved amazing things in a not amazing year. So, I've made a list of the things I have achieved. They may be small in the grand scheme of things, but they mean something to me.
My achievements:
- Finished second year and started third year
- Continued to make my new home feel like home
- Spent time with my family after three and a half years living apart
- Read 75 books
- Became the Editor in Chief of my uni magazine
- Discovered new favourites
- Survived
Culture
My relationship with "culture" has changed in 2020. By culture, I mean books, film/tv and writing. I'll also give theatre an honourable shoutout as I've missed it so much. I managed to see four plays live before everything shut down. The arts has been devastated this year and it needs a lot more than we're giving to it. Reading wise, I only managed to read 75 books. This is the lowest amount since 2017. I found joy in books, but I found that I didn't enjoy them as much as I normally would. They didn't provide as much comfort as normal. I know that a lot of people have found solace in books, I'm hoping that returns for me.
This year, I really discovered my love for film/tv. I have a lot clearer an idea of what my favourite film/tv favourites of the year were than I do books. I think it's because I know that I want to work in film/tv after I graduate. I would love to write a book, but film and tv is where my heart lies. I went to the cinema twice in 2020, and like theatre, I miss it a lot.
I told myself in 2020, that I would do more writing. I had more time. What I didn't have was the motivation. 2020 drained me of a lot of energy. What with my degree, creating blog content and working on the uni magazine, it felt like spending my free time at my laptop was a bit pointless. Hopefully after I graduate, I will have time and motivation to work on my writing.
I think it's safe to conclude that 2020 was not the best year, but there were moments of lightness. I would say let's hope that 2021 is a better year, but I have very low expectations. I'm just happy this year is over.
Carenza :) x
