We recently took up sailing. While my husband is fairly new to sailing, he is an experienced mariner. I am not naturally comfortable on the water, but I’m learning.  I train at home for strength (raising those sails) and balance, because I am in charge of getting to the front of the boat when it is moving to catch the mooring.

I am hardly the first to equate the unpredictability of sailing with the twists and turns of our human existence, the fallacy of ever really being in control.  But I’ve been thinking a lot about how the pandemic, as well as climate change and terrorism, have punctuated our lack of control with many exclamation points, and especially how this lesson has and will affect school age children and young adults.

There were certain things most people in this country took for granted — children would go to school during the school year, you could buy what you needed at the grocery store, you could see your family and friends whenever time and money allowed, and that wild weather would be a rare occurrence.  If you are a New Yorker, add two things – the subways will always run, and Broadway never closes.

For the younger generation, add seeing their friends, meeting new people, playing sports, touring colleges, going to Prom. All things that were counted on pre-pandemic without even thinking about it. It’s like the sky was now green instead of blue.  Unfathomable, until it happened.

It’s harder to adapt to change as you get older, because we get so used to doing and seeing things a certain way. But the younger generation hasn’t had the luxury of getting comfortable. They are sailing in unpredictable waters, with winds that can reverse and become dangerous on a dime. They have learned not to count on much of anything, which makes me sad.  My hope is that in the end, this winds up being an advantage. An evolutionary leap of extreme adaptability brought on by necessity.  Green skies, no problem.