Out of any year in recent history, I can't think of one that I've looked forward to quite as much as 2020. Something about it feels different than the others.

I rang in the new year with no bells at all; just a quiet acknowledgement of the turning hand on the clock — a new hour, a new year, a new decade — and then turned my attention back to the movie I was watching on my parents' couch with a friend. There was no carousing, no fireworks, no champagne — just a tiny feeling in the back of my mind that some moment had finally arrived. I'm relaxed, I'm ready.