Two vaults, two outcomes

On July 23, 1996, American gymnast Kerri Strug, competing in the Atlanta Olympic Games, sprinted down a vault runway and launched herself into the air.

When she landed, she badly injured her foot.

Believing that she needed to vault again for Team USA to win the team gold medal -- and told by her coach, Bela Karolyi, that she needed to "shake it off" -- she sprinted back down that runway, launched herself in the air, and this time, landed, held her balance on one foot, and saluted the judges.

Then she collapsed onto the mat in pain. 

Team USA had the gold medal, the first team gymnastics gold ever.

Hooray for the USA!  Hooray for Kerri! What grit, courage, and bravery, to push through the pain for her team! 

Fast forward 25 years. 

On July 27, 2021, American gymnast Simone Biles, competing in the Tokyo Olympic Games, sprinted down a vault runway and launched herself into the air.

While in the air, she realized that she didn't know where she was. She had what in gymnastics is called "the twisties." She had no idea of her body position in the air, and when you're a gymnast, that is dangerous.

Through sheer grit and athleticism, she landed her vault.

Then she had a conversation with her coaches. 

Then she took off her bar grips, which she'd put on to compete in the uneven bars, hugged her teammates, and sat down. 

The news broke moments later:  Simone Biles, the best gymnast in the world, had withdrawn from the team competition. 

The remaining gymnasts, Sunisa Lee, Jordan Chiles, and Grace McCallum, stepped up and won the silver team medal for Team USA. The Russian team, competing under the name "Russian Olympic Committee" due to a doping scandal by other Russian athletes, took the team gold for the first time since 1992.

Afterwards, Biles explained that she was not in the right head space and feared that she would cost Team USA any chance for a medal, so it was best for her to withdraw. She also said that she trusted her teammates to do the job. 

And instead of leaving the arena, she stayed in her sweats, gave chalk to her teammates, gave hugs and encouragement, and was the first one to go and congratulate the Russian team for winning the gold medal.

Immediately, the social media sphere lit up, with both commendation and condemnation.

"Simone did the right thing."
"Simone let her team down."
"Simone could have seriously injured herself." 

"Simone should have stayed home and given someone else the chance to compete!"

Many condemners trotted out Kerri Strug's 1996 vault as an example of grit, courage, and pushing through. "Kerri didn't let her team down like Simone did!"

A Twitterer commented that "the team lost". To the reply, "The team won a silver medal without her; that speaks to their talent," the Twitterer answered, "Silver medal. The first loser." Then he posted a video of Kerri Strug's 1996 vault with the comment,"Now that's bravery. That's putting the team first. Your 'silver medal stance' is a loser attitude. The US Olympic team didn't go there to 'win' second. Anything short of gold is failure."

I'm very glad that this person is not Simone's coach. 

In 1996, Kerri Strug felt that she had to push through to win a gold medal. It turned out that Kerri didn't need to do that vault. The US would have won gold without it. 

What the general public didn't know at the time was that Kerri Strug, and the rest of the Magnificent Seven, the Fierce Five, and the Final Five (the nicknames given to Team USA in 1996, 2012, and 2016 respectively) were the products of an abusive coaching system where injuries were either ignored or not taken seriously, emotional abuse was rampant, and their team doctor was a child molester.

In fact, a photo from the 1996 Olympics shows an injured Kerri Strug being helped off the floor by Bela Karolyi . . . straight into the arms of Larry Nassar, who was convicted of sexual assault in 2018. 

I don't know if Nassar abused any of the team members in 1996. We do know that he abused the team members of the 2012 and 2016 team, along with nearly two hundred other women. Simone Biles is one of the women he abused. She stated in an interview that she's the last survivor of Larry Nassar's abuse to be competing, and as long as she's around, USA Gymnastics, the governing body of the sport, would not be able to sweep abuse under the rug. 

Kerri Strug probably felt that she could not say "no" to her coach, that she had to push through for that gold medal. For all intents and purposes, she didn't have a choice.

On July 23, 1996, Kerri Strug didn't have a choice but to run on an injured ankle lest she risk the wrath of her coach.

On July 27, 2021, Simone Biles had a choice, and she said, no. It is not safe for me to compete. 

Those that believe she let down her team, that she is a "quitter", she is "selfish", she is "a sociopath" (that latter comment is from Charlie Kirk, president of Turning Point USA), let me ask you: are you willing to pay her medical bills if anything happens to her? If she breaks her neck like Russian gymnast Elena Mukhina did in 1980 and American gymnast Julissa Gomez did in 1988?  

Elena Mukhina lived as a paraplegic until her death in 2006.

Julissa Gomez lived as a quadriplegic in a coma until her death in 1991.

The day after Simone Biles withdrew from the team competition, she also withdrew from the all-around. It's uncertain whether she will compete in the individual apparatus events. 

I'm disappointed that I will not see her compete in the all-around. I'm sad that she did not compete in the rest of the team competition.

But Simone Biles does not owe me or anyone else an explanation or justification for her decisions. Simone Biles is not obligated to display herself for our entertainment. If she does not feel safe competing, whether it be for physical reasons, mental reasons, or both, she has the absolute right to say, "No, I'm not going to do it."

Sometimes, a coach may need to give gentle encouragement or a dose of tough love to an athlete so that they can compete. 

Sometimes, a coach needs to empower the athlete to make the choice whether or not to compete. 

Kerri Strug did not have that choice in 1996.

Simone Biles had it in 2021, and exercised it.

The outcome for Kerri's vault was a gold medal, and a serious injury.

The outcome for Simone's vault was a decision not to risk serious injury, physically or mentally.

I honor Simone for her choice.

It's time we give it to our athletes.

They deserve it.

Just my .04, adjusted for inflation.

Glass + Hot Oil = One Big Mess

It all started on Sunday afternoon, when I thought I'd get a head start on a proofing job. 

I think most of the people who read my writing know that I proofread depositions for a court reporting firm in another state. The money I earn goes to pay back debt. Right now, we have my student loans (from a failed attempt at court reporting school), a loan we took out to help pay for a roof replacement, and our mortgage to pay back. There's allegedly a secret clause in every student loan contract that says that you are not allowed to die before you pay back your loans.  If that's the case, I will have a very long life.

The job I had was 270 pages and had a hard deadline of yesterday at 3:30. Deadlines are the nature of the business here; lawyers need their stuff back at a particular time, which means the people I work for have to have their stuff back at a particular time. 

So, I started work in mid-afternoon on Sunday. I thought, well, I'll just do what I can today, I've got until 3:30 tomorrow.  Plenty of time, right?

Then I realized, no, you don't have until 3:30 tomorrow. Because you have to leave at noon to take your son to an appointment at 1 p.m. and it's going to take you an hour to get there!  

Cue stress level rising exponentially. 

I had thought about asking my husband to start going to the gym with me early in the morning before we both start work (we both work from home). When I added up the amount of time I needed to get my work done before I had to leave, I realized that doing that was just not possible. I couldn't even get to the gym, and it's something I've been badly inconsistent in doing. 

Monday morning, I started work around 6:30 a.m. 

I finished at just before noon.

I've been using the pomodoro technique; a technique where you work for a certain amount of focused time, take a five-minute break, then go back to work. The particular app I am using tells you what time your job will be done based on the number of pomodoros you think it will take to finish the job. 

The app said I would be done around 12:30.  When the time was calculated, it included the time breaks.

Remember, I said it would take an hour to get to a 1 p.m. appointment. 

I couldn't even take the breaks I needed! 

Well, the job got done. I was also able to get my son to and from his appointment. 

We didn't get home until just past 2:30. And I still needed to eat lunch. 

I spent the afternoon recuperating, then started dinner.  I decided to make salmon patties.  Quick and easy. :-) 

So I mixed up everything I needed, which included putting oil into a frying pan to fry the patties.  

I made enough for today and tomorrow. 

And afterwards, I poured the hot oil -- keep in mind, the hot oil -- into a glass jar that I keep for that purpose.

In the middle of the pouring, I heard a crack. 

And I saw oil start to pour out from the bottom of the jar.  

You see, I had forgotten basic science:  that when you pour hot oil into a glass jar, the glass jar will break! 

My kitchen counter, my kitchen floor, and one of my kitchen cupboards ended up being covered with slippery oil.

My husband sprang into action and cleaned up the mess. After dinner, we washed the dishes (mostly my set of cutting boards) that were in the path of the spilled oil.

Just writing this out is exhausting. 

Fortunately, I made enough salmon patties for dinner tonight.  There will be no danger of me pouring hot oil into anything. 

And I have two more hard deadlines to meet. 

While I'm lucky to have work and grateful that my schedule is flexible, days like this can wear me out.

Just my .04, adjusted for inflation.

Tina's TEOTWAWKI Journal, Day 365

One year.

For me, the pandemic began on March 13, 2020, when my son had his first day out of school.  We didn't know then that he wouldn't be going back until August and that he'd have to finish the school year online. 

We didn't know that my husband wouldn't be going to the office for about two months, and that he'd end up taking over my office four days a week.

We didn't know that March 8th, 2020 would be the last time our church would meet together until November. 

We didn't know that masks would become a fashion statement or that people would judge others by whether they did or did not wear one. 

So many things we did not know. 

I began journaling the pandemic here on March 13, 2020, thinking that I would write every day and bring a healthy dose of snark to everyone's pandemic coping skills. How wrong I was. I can't remember when I stopped writing a daily pandemic journal. Snark is a good way to cope, depending on the target of your snark . . . but you can only be snarky for so long. 

My good intentions to spend more time on writing and house cleaning were eventually sabotaged by, well, just pandemic weariness. 

It's been a long 365 days, and like just about everyone, I'm weary. 

In the beginning, there was a pulling together, an attitude of, "We're all in this together." But that faded as we realized just how long and how serious this pandemic would be. 

Now, Zoom meetings and online church are the norm, social distancing is expected, a "drive-by" refers to a type of celebration rather than a shooting, and when you extend a fist to someone, it is not an assault but a greeting.

Throw in the deaths of Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor (who died one year ago today) and George Floyd -- along with others -- and a very contentious presidential election, and you have a recipe for both angst and exhaustion.

Right now, I lean more towards the exhaustion end of the spectrum.

One thing that helps is remembering that no one on earth is unaffected by COVID. If you haven't had it, you know someone who has; if you don't know anyone who has had COVID, you still have dealt with empty shelves, standing six feet apart in a public place, businesses closed, businesses requiring masks . . .

Monday, my husband and I become eligible for the COVID vaccine. It's the one time in my life I look forward to getting two shots. 

Right now, I just confess to weariness. 

TEOTWAWKI, for those wondering, is an acronym in prepper circles that means "The End Of The World As We Know It." (And you thought it was just a title of an R.E.M. song.)

To be honest, this past year? 

It has been TEOTWAWKI.

Just my .04, adjusted for inflation.

Adventures in transitioning

My son's school bus pulled up in front of our house for the last time on Wednesday, February 10 at around 1:15 p.m.

When it pulled away, it took with it many of the services that we've depended on for over 18 years.

We have now entered into the land known as "transitioning".

Matthew, right now, is in sort of the "no-man's-land" between school and work. We're working right now with our Voc Rehab to (hopefully!) find him work. 

Part of transitioning means learning how to manage money, and as a first step in that direction, I set up an appointment for today to open a joint account with Matthew at the bank. 

While my intentions for teaching Matthew money management were good, my schedule management hit a snag. 

You see, today is a Tuesday.

Tuesdays are the days my husband goes into the office.

With our car.

Which I didn't remember until I walked into our garage to manage laundry and saw that said garage was empty. 

To quote either Astro from The Jetsons or Scooby-Doo, "ruh-rho".

It crossed my mind that maybe I should reschedule the appointment.

But then I remembered another part of transitioning that is important:  learning how to use public transportation.

So I decided that this would be the best time to introduce Matthew and me to the wonderful world of Uber. 

I had the app, I've just never used it before. But, with a few taps, I figured out what I was doing and, to make a long story short, both of us were safely transported to and from the bank by two separate Uber drivers. 

Inside the bank, we were helped by a very nice young woman who got us set up with a joint account. 

I don't expect to be able to problem-solve as easily as I did today. But it was an, shall we say, interesting introduction to the world of transitioning! 

Just my .04, adjusted for inflation.

When character no longer counts

In April, 1987, then presidential candidate Gary Hart, responding to rumors of marital infidelity, threw down the gauntlet.  He challenged the press to "follow me around".

The Miami Herald took up the gauntlet and soon discovered his relationship with a young woman, Donna Rice.  

Not long afterwards, Gary Hart quit the presidential race . . . only to reverse course several months later with the declaration, "Let the people decide; I'm back in the race!"

During those days, I heard people asking the question, "Does character really matter when you're running for public office?"

I asked myself, "Why is this even a question?  Of course character counts!"

Apparently, many Americans did not feel the same way, because in 1992, even amid rumors of past infidelity, Bill Clinton was elected to the Presidency, and then re-elected in 1996.  

In 1998, the Monica Lewinsky scandal blew up.  

At that time, certain evangelical Christian leaders -- including Franklin Graham and James Dobson -- stood up and declared, "Yes, character counts in a President!"

Some of those same leaders, in 2016, reversed course and supported Donald Trump for president, despite his known affairs with at least two women and his disgusting remarks about women that were leaked to the media.  

Did character count then?

Apparently not.  

This is what happens when you are so fearful of one particular candidate that you end up supporting the other, despite the character flaws that you condemned so forcefully when the candidate was not the one you supported.

There are Presidents who have done things for this country and have been adulterers and have committed other sins during their time in office.  Thomas Jefferson is now well-known for his dalliances (some would say, rape of) with Sally Hemings. John F. Kennedy left of trail of infidelity behind him.  And FDR's relationship with Lucy Mercer Rutherford is also well-documented.  

As many things as they did for this country, for me, their legacy is forever tainted by the way they treated their wives.  Or, as in Jefferson's case, the women around them (I say that because Jefferson's wife had died by the time he was in the White House.)  

Should a person who has committed adultery -- or, for that matter, any other sin -- be permanently barred from running for public office?

I don't know.  I can only tell you what I think:  If someone has committed adultery, if they have repented, if they have gotten help, if they have remained faithful to their spouse since the days of that adultery, then no, I don't think that should permanently bar them from public office. People do sin. People do repent of sin. God does forgive sin. 

What I resent is the cries of, "Yes, character counts!" from respected Christians only to have those same Christians turn around and say, "Yeah, the guy has rotten character, but look at King Cyrus! God used him!" Or, "King David committed adultery with Bathsheba and God used him!" Or, "He wasn't elected to be our pastor!" 

Number one, the prophesy about King Cyrus was fulfilled when he allowed the Israelites to go home after 70 years of exile. That prophecy was not intended to be extrapolated onto a future President of the United States.

Number two, although God did use David after he sinned, there are two things to keep in mind:  a) David repented (see Psalm 51) and b) David paid a very steep price for his sins. The son he conceived with Bathsheba died. His daughter Tamar was raped by her half-brother Amnon, and David did nothing about it. David's son Absalom attempted to seize the throne. Absalom raped ten of David's concubines, and then was ultimately killed by David's own general, Joab.

No President is perfect.  We all sin.  Presidents sin. 

But what we saw on Wednesday afternoon unfold on our TV screens is the ultimate result of what happens when we decide that character no longer counts in a President. 

We end up getting a President who is unwilling to concede an election until absolutely forced to, who continues to propagate a false narrative about a stolen election, and who whips a crowd up into such a frenzy that they feel free to storm the US Capitol, with Congress inside, and break into the House and Senate chambers in order to take selfies and trash the place. 

We decided way back in 1987 that character no longer mattered in a President. 

We are now reaping the consequences of that decision.

Just my .04, adjusted for inflation.

Day of Infamy, Redux

Yesterday, January 6, 2021, a date which will live in infamy, the United States was suddenly and deliberately attacked by an out-of-control mob.

Like the attack on Pearl Harbor, we should have seen this coming, and many people did see something like this coming.

When a group of people who President Trump famously told to "stand back and stand by" announce that they will be in the nation's capital on the day the Electoral College was ratified, for the specific purpose of protesting the results of that Electoral College, and when the President of the United States himself welcomes them, tells people the time and date of a "stop the steal" rally, and then exhorts them informing them that "you will never take back our country with weakness", you should know that things have the potential to not end well.

Indeed, it ended badly.

The crowd, bearing Trump banners, Trump flags, Trump hats, probably Trump T-shirts, and most disgustingly, American flags and the Christian flag which hangs in many churches, marched down Pennsylvania Avenue, right to the building where, in their mind, the greatest threat to the United States of America sat:  the 535 members of the United States Congress and the Vice-President of the United States.

Once there, they forced their way past a police barrier and swarmed the steps of the Capitol Building.

I was watching CSPAN on my computer, thinking that I just had a ringside seat to political theatre and ready to spend several hours mentally rolling my eyes at the hot air and stupidity of certain Congresspeople (I'm looking at you, Ted Cruz!) 

Then I started hearing reports of protestors surrounding the Capitol, so I decided to pack up the computer and move to the TV. 

I left the room briefly.

When I came back, I saw people marching into the Capitol.  This is the Capitol building which has been off-limits to the general public since COVID hit. 

And that's when I said, "Oh, my God."

The world now knows the evolving and the devolving of the situation over the next several hours.

They now know that protestors rammed the barricaded door of the House chambers.

They now know that protestors got into the House chambers and the Senate chambers. One protestor got his picture taken in the seat that the Vice President uses to preside over the Senate when it was in session.

One protestor got into House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's office, plopped himself down in her chair, got his picture taken, and then swiped a piece of mail from her desk, leaving her a quarter to pay for it.  (Does he not know that the price of a stamp has not been a quarter for years?) 

A group of protestors were pictured scaling a wall to get onto the Capitol grounds.  If you are a Baby Boomer or an older Gen Xer, you may remember film footage of Iranian terrorists hoisting themselves over the walls of the American Embassy in Tehran, Iran in 1979.  I remember that footage, and the photo of the people climbing the wall brought back memories of that awful time.

Another group "borrowed" a scaffold to lower the American flag and replace it with a Trump flag.

Still other protestors broke windows of the US Capitol to get inside.  When I heard that piece of news, that, for me, was the point where that protest stopped being "peaceful" and started being "violent".

We also now know that there were people who acted at great risk to keep the members of Congress safe. They ordered everyone to get down, gave them gas masks, and had them lie on the floor while outside, people pounded on the barricaded doors.  

People in the building were ordered to stay away from windows and make no noise. Just like an entire generation of school children have had to do for the last 20 years to protect themselves from mass shooters.

One pipe bomb was found at the local offices of the Democratic National Committee.  Another was found at the local offices of the Republican National Committee.  Apparently, some protesters were non-partisan in their desire for destruction.  And if pipe bombs were not enough, the police also had to remove a cooler full of Molotov cocktails.  (I assume these were not on ice and were probably not intended to be served "shaken, not stirred".)

And where, during all of this turmoil, was our President? 

Sitting in the Oval Office, watching the unraveling of the law and order he so proudly championed during his campaign for Presidency and making no move to stop it.

Until he made a video telling everyone, we love you, you're special, the election was still stolen, but you need to go home.

Five people are now dead as the result of this madness.  One woman, Ashli Babbitt, 35, described as a pro-Trump California native and Air Force veteran, was shot by Capitol Police.  The other three -- one a woman from Kennesaw (metro Atlanta) -- died from "medical emergencies" on the scene.  The death of number five, a US Capitol Police officer, was announced as I was writing this.  

Over 50 police officers were hurt. I do not know how many protestors were hurt.  

In the camera shots of the front of the Capitol, if you watch long enough, you'll notice that there are protestors being escorted out.  When I saw that, I asked myself, "Okay, why are the cops not using their batons to break up this group?"

I wasn't the only one that picked up on that. A good number of people -- including President-elect Joe Biden -- commented that if these protesters had been mostly black, instead of mostly white, the police response would have been a lot different. I have friends who are convinced that the police would have started shooting into the crowd.  And, given the experiences of African-Americans with the police, I can't disagree with those who feel that way.

At the moment, we have growing calls for either impeachment or the invoking of the 25th Amendment, which calls for the removal of the President if he is deemed unfit to perform his duties.  We also have a list of staff members who've resigned, including Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao, who is also the wife of Senator Mitch McConnell. 

In the immediate aftermath of the Capitol riot, the now-traumatized Representatives and Senators, along with staff, went back to work.  For all of my criticism of Washington, DC politics, these men and women are to be commended for going back in and finishing the job they were Constitutionally mandated to do, which is, follow the Constitution and certify the results of the Presidential election.  

And, despite the stubbornness -- or stupidity -- of those who still protested the Electoral College results, Joe Biden was confirmed as the winner of the Presidential election, January 7, 2021, at close to 4 a.m.  

Donald J. Trump will be President for 13 more days, barring unforeseen events. 

I pray we last long enough to get to the inauguration.

I do not want another day of infamy.

Just my .04, adjusted for inflation.

Five letters, one hyphen, two numbers

Five letters.

One hyphen.

Two numbers.

Nothing else had a greater impact on our lives last year than those eight written symbols.  (And boy, am I glad to write those words, "last year".)

It was a year ago since the initial reports of "a new virus in Wuhan, China" first started trickling in.  In February, I visited my doctor and commented about how no, I didn't need to worry about "that new thing in China" because I hadn't been out of the country.

Just a few days later, I read a headline saying that the CDC was warning us to be preparing for "significant disruptions", and I thought, "This sounds like fearmongering, but just in case, I better start stocking up on food."

I count March 13th as the day all hell broke loose.

March 13th was the first day that my son was home from school on a school holiday that would have been a make up snow day.  He did not go back into a physical building until August. 

How to describe a visit to a local Kroger on that week?  People were not angry, or screaming, or shoving each other out of the way.  It was just a very busy buzz, people going up and down the aisles, grabbing the stuff they needed, standing in lines, not full of screaming anxiety but rather with jaws grimly set.  

I remember driving down the road that week in March, listening to the news, and thinking, "I will not panic.  I will not panic." I fall into the category of "prepper", and while I do not have an underground bunker against the unlikely possibility of thermonuclear war, I do believe in keeping a full pantry and a decent amount in savings. So when rumblings of a pandemic hit, my purchases were more in the category of comfort food (think Fritos, Lays, and M & M's) than in necessities. I did make a bread run and was nicely told at the checkout counter, next time, the limit is two or four loaves. I also yelled, "Score!" to someone who was coming out of Aldi with a package of paper towels.  She laughed. 

I cannot complain about how "no one else had to deal with . . ." because no one on earth remained unaffected by these five letters, one hyphen, and two numbers.  In fact, I feel rather bubbled.  My husband was able to transfer to working at home.  I already work at home.  Our biggest challenge was switching office areas and getting adjusted to a new schedule.  Going along with that challenge was getting my husband set up to be able to work at home!  

My poor son had a hard time adjusting.  Since he has autism, he has a difficult time with changes in routine.  And his poor mother had a meltdown when she couldn't get the scanner on her computer properly. 

But since then, we, along with the majority of the world, have learned how to work Zoom or whatever your communications platform is. ("You're on mute" is the sentence of 2020.)

We learned to work with online church and a chat room (which my son was the first to enter on Sundays.) And I learned how to make communion bread.  

For weeks, I mentally sang "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star" while washing my hands.  When I got bored with that, I switched to "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Bat". 

And, like so many in the world, I watched and listened in alternating pride, disbelief, horror, shock, anger, surprise, and other words in the gamut of emotions as the year unfolded.

The term "essential worker" is now a permanent addition to our vocabulary. So is "social distancing". 

Who can forget the pictures of doctors and nurses slumped over in exhaustion, their faces bruised from the hours of wearing a medical-grade mask? 

And while sitting at my home office desk in Atlanta, I watched as simmering fury over the death of George Floyd while in police custody boiled over into rioting. In the days that followed, we heard and saw protest, grief, lament, and expressions of exhaustion.  (I know people who participated non-violently in local area protests.  I was very proud of them.)

And as I write this, our President still refuses to accept that he was voted out of office by the American people. While the simmering political anger has not yet exploded into major rioting and major violence, I am still waiting for the other shoe to drop. 

Today is the first day of a new year, and like I said earlier, I was never so glad to say "last year" than I was when the ball dropped at Times Square and the socially distanced crowd counted down to "Happy New Year!" I nearly cried. 

I have no illusions that just flipping the calendar over, or putting a new calendar on the wall, is going to magically change anything.  I also have no illusions that a transfer of power on January 20th will magically pull our country out of our pessimistic funk. The best I hope for is a morale boost.  New starts, or at least perceived new starts, are helpful.

Today is a new start, a clean slate of sorts. 

But here is one of the biggest lessons I have learned from this pandemic.

Five letters.

One hyphen.

Two numbers.

COVID-19.

Those eight written symbols brought the entire world to its knees in 2020.  

I think we should all be humbled by that fact.

Just my .04, adjusted for inflation.