What I’ll always remember about 2020 and 2021 are all the people that passed away because of the pandemic and how my life changed so drastically. The truth is that I spent most of the year sitting around at home and doing nothing other than assignments and texting friends. Since we can’t go outside those were my limited options. Some images that will stay with me from this year are all the pictures of protests and riots because it reminds me that even though we were in quarantine and didn’t have anything to do we found a way to do good instead of bad. We were able to change some things even though we were struggling to stay sane through this period. Some songs that mattered most to me this year are motivational songs and some random songs that just kept me calm and occupied. Some of the things I’ve celebrated in spite of how hard times have been, I was able to celebrate my birthday and family reunions when it was safe enough. These celebrations made everything feel normal even though there were some restrictions it still had a feeling of normal. Throughout this time there were many bad things that were going on like hate crimes and racism/ prejudice in our justice system which made things so much harder and made me realize many things about our policies and our justice system. But to help with that there were also many stories about good people and their kindness that restored my hope in humanity. During these times I think it’s okay to laugh because I know many people in my family that use laughing as a self-defense mechanism and I can’t take that away from them if that’s what makes them feel safe and normal. I think many kids and teens today use humor as a way to cope with the things around them so I think it’s completely fine as long as it doesn’t hurt anyone or offend anyone.