The reality of how bad 2020 was going to be started spinning up shortly after we learned of a virus that had spread out of China and was growing into a worldwide humanitarian and economic crisis. 2020 slowly slipped into a strange abyss that would be the primary catalyst for the remainder of the year. For myself, the stage set by Covid-19 would have a profound effect on my business and my life. As the year flowed on, the abyss seemed to get deeper as other life events unfolded, making it a truly challenging year.
The most notable additional event was my love and life partner being diagnosed with stage 2 triple-positive breast cancer. It is an aggressive and fast-spreading cancer that just ten years ago was an often fatal diagnosis. Today it has a near 90% survival rate, but I still had a hard time with the reality that she had cancer. That was mostly because I lost both parents to cancer several decades back, which haunted my thinking. I knew it was unreasonable to link my prior losses to the very small chance of losing my best friend and love. So, I reset my thinking and embraced the positive direction of her treatment and our time together. It was far better for me to enjoy and be present for moments we have together; things like enjoying a lovely walk with our two English labs Sage and Cassie, having morning coffee together, cooking, spending time with our family, and all the cool stuff that makes up day-to-day life. Doing that took my mind off her cancer and helped free myself to love and be with her and my family.
Cancer is scary enough by itself, but Covid made all of this even more tumultuous. For us, Covid was not just a distant news item for my family and me. Unfortunately, it impacted us at a much deeper and sad level.
My father-in-law, Jim Haliburton, died from Covid. By far, Jim was one of the most welcoming and positive people I have known, and his life experience enabled him to talk fondly of places and people he knew. When my partner and I got together, Jim was a person who made me feel a part of the family. The way he spun the tales of his trips across the world was perhaps the most charming part of him. Jim’s death was truly a loss. Thank you for everything.
Unfortunately, he was not the only one to get Covid, as my mother-in-law had it as well. She had to go into isolation when Jim had gotten sick, and she was unable to be by his side at the last moments of his life. Her final connection with him was by phone as the nurse held the receiver to his ear. I found this disturbing and sad. To die and have your last contact with your loved ones via Zoom or by phone while others mock or downplay the pandemic made me angry. I am not proud of this anger. It really brought out the worst in me as I would lash out against anybody who wanted to cast this as just the flu — an attack that truly did nothing to change the people’s minds entrenched in that line of thinking. So I took a step back and decided to follow the advice that Bernard Meltzer used to give to his callers on his radio show: “Before you speak ask yourself if what you are going to say is true, is kind, is necessary, is helpful. If the answer is no, maybe what you are about to say should be left unsaid.” I find that this is a much better place to be, and this stance helps me be much better centered as a person.
Our homelife in 2020 was, by necessity, one of isolation. The more than 100 days of weekly chemotherapy have left my partner with a compromised immune system, and with that, Covid absolutely can’t get into our household. That has dramatically shifted our interaction with everyone. I have never been a social butterfly. Even though I attend ten-plus worldwide events, running workshops or giving keynotes in a typical year, I would consider myself very socially awkward. A sudden physical disconnect from society did not seem to be a big deal at first, but we had to go beyond general social distancing to keep my partner safe. Now we really cannot go out or travel anywhere. That is a bit extreme, even for me.
So maintaining connections via social networks has been critical for me. Running the monthly Agile Coaching Network is my lifeline to the world and is one of the cornerstones to not falling into the trap of feeling disconnected or isolated from the community I enjoy. This, combined with other projects, nonprofit work, mentoring, and working with some really great people, has given me a great deal of optimism as 2020 has rolled to a close.
Rolling into 2021 has a much more optimistic feel. My partner has four more chemotherapy sessions and a couple of surgeries. I am excited and confident that they will declare her as NED (No Evidence of Disease). Our family will be a bit closer as our mother-in-law will be joining us here in Oregon, and it will be nice to have her closer to us. Hopefully, with vaccinations, we can return to a more normal life by mid-year. Our kids will hopefully get to return to regular school, ballet classes, Wushu martial arts, etc. And we all can even eat and shop wherever we want. Lastly, I look forward to visiting with all my Agile, engineering, leadership, and other community friends again. I miss the late nights writing on post-it notes, talking about concepts, ideas, and other things. It will be good to have all of that back.
So goodbye 2020. You were a tumultuous year that few could call good, but you were a year of growth and perspective that we don’t get that often. The lessons you taught me are ones of reflection of my temperament around the stresses of life. I walk away from you a little more centered and, hopefully, a better person. So with that, I have to at least say thank you for that 2020.
As for all of you, I look forward to building a great year with you. Stay safe!
