After a grilling 2020, 2021 started out with a mixture of emotions - grim but hopeful, distant from family but long WhatsApp calls, rainy but looking forward to the sunshine in the coming days. A lot of R&R is how we started our New Years, thanks to the long weekend. We read, watched tv, cooked and slept a lot! Once work started, it didn't even feel very different from the past few weeks. Unfortunately a few days into the first working week, there was chaos in the DC Capitol and many State Capitols. A riot started by an infuriating and possibly out-of-work men and women wanting to display their passionate support of an incapable President. Back to feeling uncertain and grim about the future, we were surprised by Mother Nature providing us a rare snow fall day here in Austin, TX! It was simply amazing and a great 2nd Sunday of the year where we got 3.5-4 inches of snow ! The sights were remarkable during and after the snow fall. The entire city and neighbors were thrilled...
To be fair, 2020 could have been documented much earlier in this year with more details fresh in my head as the year was passing by. But honestly, I am writing this piece to prove that even in one of the toughest and oddest year, there have been blessings - a lot more family time, time of looking inward, getting in touch with friends and growth indeed both individually and for my family. The year kicked off with my MBA core classes at Baylor, since I had chosen the online program there was no worry about additional driving/commute time but it was certainly challenging to adjust to studying on top of juggling all the other aspects of life including work and dance classes as my side hustle. Once I made it through the first term (Jan - Feb), March was when the whole pandemic impact began in the USA. Closer to mid-March, I was panicking about COVID-19 with the rest of the world and since we have family back in India we had already been kept abreast about new actions being taken ...