Covid-19: 2020 grads

The other day I mentioned receiving a Class of 2020 graduation announcement in the mail, for our handsome, active, awesome great-nephew Trey. Here it is:

On the back is another photo and a quote: "Love the life you live. Live the life you love." Bob Marley

Congratulations to Trey and to all your classmates, as the next stage of life opens up before you!

Another other day, just a few days ago, we were driving up Highway 1 from Carmel toward Monterey and saw dozens and dozens of signs along the road, celebrating the Carmel High class of 2020—each grad individually. It was a lovely, even a stirring, sight.

Yesterday I ran across a YouTube video that features all those signs, all those grads; musical accompaniment is "Graduation" by Vitamin C —very fitting. Even though I don't know any of these kids personally, the video brings tears to my eyes: their feat of finishing up and moving on to whatever's next; the fact that they don't get to participate in the traditional rite of passage; all those beautiful young lives going out into the world and, I hope, working to make it better. Here's the video (it's worth it for the faces and the music):

Two young women are featured at the end, with the words "You'll always be in our hearts": Annabelle Vandenbroucke and Munira Mohammed. Annabelle died several days after she was injured in a head-on collision, in July 2016. She was sixteen. I do not know Munira's story. But . . . how lovely, and sad, that whoever made this film singled them out for remembrance. They would have been (were) the class of 2020 as well.

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Monterey County's numbers keep bounding upward. I don't know why. More people getting tested, and many of the cases have been asymptomatic? In any event, today the count of confirmed cases is 469, up 28 since yesterday; hospitalizations are up 1, to 55; deaths remain steady at 8.

Stay healthy. Celebrate our coming-up young people: they will carry us forward. Be kind to one another.