2020 Was One of My Best Years.

Most Americans are saying f**k 2020. Even the ones who weren’t financially affected by the pandemic. That’s great because it shows that most people are compassionate for what others go through. So, speaking for America, yeah f**k 2020, but for me personally it was a pretty good year.

The pandemic did have me nervous for a moment. I was active-duty Army and expected to ETS (leave the military) in July 2020. When social distance orders went active in the middle of March I felt scared because I only had two choices at the time: continue to ETS and possibly not have a job lined up or reenlist for three years to fulfill Recruiter orders.

I felt sick. I heard nothing good about Recruiter duty and I definitely didn’t want to stay in the military for another three years. I also didn’t want to risk ETSing and possibly putting me and my wife in a stressful situation because I couldn’t get a job.

Thankfully, by mid-April the military allowed service members to extend their contracts for three months to a year for those who were scheduled to ETS in 2020 but did not want to reenlist. I chose to extend my contract for six months: enough time for the world to get back on it’s feet and six more months in the Army was doable.

The six months extension pushed my ETS date back to March 2021. Since then, I been mostly working from home. Then half day schedules to every other day schedules depending on the restrictions of my state. My income stayed the same and my stress levels lowered. During the pandemic I accumulated 104 days of leave, so I was able to ETS on December 14 and I’ll still get paid by the military until 27 March.

Yeah you read that correctly. I have three and half months of paid leave. I’m blessed to say I left 2020 with a bang instead of a good riddance.

And for all of those who woke up on January 1, 2021, you are also blessed. A lot of people who struggled due to this pandemic will continue recovering in 2021. People who merely had to work from home will be happy as they gradually get their social life back.

America lost over 200,000 people from this pandemic. And we lost some inspirational celebrities to tragedies and illnesses like Kobe Bryant and Chadwick Boseman. The Black community continued to protest police brutality; but we won’t see much of Black Lives Matter again until 2024. This pandemic taught a lot of people about financial stability, friendships, marriages, job security and so on. A lot of people just want to forget this year ever existed. For me, I’ll remember this year as one of those years when life was pretty easy.