Editorial: 2020 was rough; be each other’s light
Last year at this time, none of us knew what lay ahead. Even those who might have heard via news reports that a pandemic was beginning to spread across the other side of the world, likely could not have been able to imagine the devastating reality of more than 312,000 Americans dead from it a year later.
It is a gross understatement to say that 2020 has been a rough year. And for most of us, it is like no year we can remember. We’ve lost loved ones; lost jobs; lost businesses. We’ve suffered from isolation, anxiety, and depression. Some of us have suffered through the disease itself. Kids have missed school, sports, band concerts, trips, dances, and dramatic performances. As a community we missed Crazy Cash, almost all of St. Mary’s Fish Fry, the Memorial Day Parade, gazebo concerts, the MHS Alumni Banquet, golf outings, the Independence Day Fireworks, the Chicken Broil, Run Manchester, the Manchester Community Fair, most of the ice cream socials, the CRC Volunteer Recognition banquet, and most recently Christmas in the Village craft shows & parade.
Manchester is resilient and events that could be modified were. There were no gazebo concerts this year but there were online and other outdoor concerts. The fair may have been canceled (or postponed), but the Swine and Steer Clubs were able to sell their animals via online auction. The Manchester High School graduation and the Canoe Race both happened–just later than usual and with social distancing and masks. The CROP Walk, community-wide garage sale, trick-or-treating, (along with caramel apples and pumpkin bowling), Mens Club Christmas tree sale, and Live Nativity all happened too, if slightly modified.
Additionally, residents created new, safer events like a drive-by tractor show, virtual fairy festival and fairy garden walking tour, a Manchester Road Rally, a car parade to honor graduates and another to honor teachers, and drive-through visits with Santa.
This year saw changes in the business community as well. We lost Two Black Sheep but gained the new Worth Repeating, Beauty by Kellie Dawna, Sweet Leilani, Horning Farm’s cheese shop, and the highly anticipated River Raisin Distillery. While the Dairy Queen didn’t open this summer, Emanuel Church’s Ice Cream trailer stepped in to fill the gap. And a few weeks ago, came the exciting news that the new owners of the Manchester Market building would be opening a full service grocery store in the space in conjunction with Acorn Farmers Market and Café, in early February.
It is easy to focus on the things we “lost” and what we have “missed out” on this year–but there were many stories, big and small, that are worth remembering. Some of these were directly related to the pandemic. The community came together when the schools closed in the spring, to try to provide internet access for students who were struggling to complete school work. The township halls and school provided wifi hotspots in their parking lots and the library purchased a number of hotspots that could be checked out by patrons. Local sewing enthusiasts mobilized as soon as the CDC recommended wearing cloth masks and sewed hundreds that were distributed for free in a bin downtown. And residents put out yard signs, ribbons, and more, thanking the many essential workers in our community.
There were other notable non-pandemic related additions to the community this year, as well. There was the installation of the KaBoom park equipment that extends throughout the village and the recent shared use trail improvements. The schools built a new agriscience barn for Botany & Zoology classes and the FFA, using donations made for that purpose. Watkins Lake State Park & County Preserve’s historic role in the Underground Railroad was verified and it officially became a Network to Freedom Site. Also, thanks to St. Joseph Mercy Chelsea, a free shuttle bus now runs twice a week between Manchester and Chelsea.
It should also be noted that this year our local township clerks and their assistants ran not one, but two, elections with record-breaking turnout, during a pandemic.
If you are looking for the heartwarming stories from this year, remember when Washtenaw’s 4H students donated 131.3 pounds of frozen turkey raised by members to the Community Resource Center. Remember when the whole community followed the story of lost dog Cisco and his eventual reunion with his owners. Remember the many residents donating cans and bottles to pay for the service dog Mystique. Remember that when the Memorial Day parade was canceled, high school students Liam Hiller and Jacob Mann took it upon themselves to play “Taps” on the Main Street Bridge anyway.
With the vaccination against COVID-19 just beginning here at the end of 2020, we are finally getting a glimpse of light at the end of the tunnel. It is thought that it will be spring, or even summer, before enough of the population is vaccinated for things to begin to return to normal. What that normal will look like, we don’t know. But we know it will come.
We have a long dark winter between here and there … but we are not alone. We can be each other’s lights in the darkness while we wait for spring. On Christmas Eve, after dark, walk or drive around and watch our neighbors light their luminaria.
If any community can be each other’s light through this dark winter, it is Manchester.
Luminaria line Main Street in front of Wurster Park on a previous years Christmas Eve
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