Three Years Later

VIEWPOINT

By RALPH HARDIN

Evening Times Editor

Every now and then I have to go back and look at one of our previous editions of the Times to research a story or get some frame of reference for a current edition of the paper that I’m working on.

So, today, I was going back and looking at our more recent editions of the special “Progress” section that we do each year that highlights some of the big moves and changes that our local businesses, schools and organizations have undergone over the past year. Anyway, as I was going through the back issue catalog (which you can do yourself, in case you didn’t know, on our web site if you are a subscriber), I came across a column I wrote around this time of year in 2020.

You might have gotten a little PTSD just from seeing that year in print again, because it was right around this time three years ago that we were all starting to get the feeling that this whole COVID-19 thing was going to have a bigger impact than we were being initially led to believe.

Yes, at this point, we were past that “shut everything down for two weeks to flatten the curve” deal that we all got behind and we were starting to move into more of the

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“shelter in place” and “quarantine” and “we’re all in this together” type of stuff. The kids never did go back to school after the end of Spring Break. Everything that had been postponed moved on to being canceled altogether. And if you weren’t considered an “essential worker,” you probably didn’t have to go to work.

Well, I went to work… OK, the truth is work just came home with me. At the Times, we were in a weird transitional phase anyway. In January of 2020, the paper had just been sold and now, just a few months later, we were forced to close the office and set up shop in our homes. And although we do now have a newer, smaller office (at 306 N. Missouri St., Suite 10, upstairs in the Stewart Title Building, in case you didn’t know), I’ve fully embraced the work-from-home lifestyle. From what I understand, many of you have too.

But, man, can you believe it has been three whole years since we all had to accept that we were in fact facing a global pandemic. Remember masking up just to go to the store and all those “Thank you for social distancing” stickers placed six feet apart everywhere you went — assuming you left the house at all? Remember distance learning and remote meetings and, oh all the ZOOM calls? I put a jacket on the other day that I guess I hadn’t worn in a while and reached into the pocket and pulled out my trusty West Memphis Blue Devils face mask. It was a silkscreen mask that was one of the few I found that didn’t make me feel to claustrophobic. And I guess it worked because I still (knock on ALL the wood) haven’t had COVID-19 despite everyone in my family having it at least once. We seem to have (for the most part) put the pandemic behind us these days. There have been just three COVID-19 related deaths in Crittenden County this year and new cases have averaged in the single digits for all but two days in 2023.

Three years… a long time, but not long enough for us to forget those we lost and those who are still being affected.