This week in COVID Quarantine 6/1/20

This week in COVID Quarantine 6/1/20

Pittstop had been on hiatus to finish on-line classes under quarantine and to try to salvage some portion of my last days as a high school senior. But with so many events culminating this week in my personal life, in sports, in our nation, I knew I needed to get back to the blog.

This week, for me personally, I visited the interior of my high school in mask and gloves, probably for the last time in 2020.  I took senior pictures, picked up my cap and gown and other items in preparation for my online Commencement Ceremony last Saturday. It was surreal to say the least. These past months were supposed to be filled with senior pranks, senior parties, senior PROM and then a march through our auditorium to receive our high school diplomas. Instead, we were all stuck inside, taking our final classes online, Zoom meetings with friends, lots of Netflix, lots of video games, lots of home-cooking and wiping down our groceries!  Well, I’m a high school graduate now, but it still feels strange to have missed out on a traditional senior year and one we will never get back. 

But the Class of 2020 worldwide has learned far greater life lessons these past three months than probably any other graduating class in history, and we have worked social media and technology to our benefit so as not to feel so alone and isolated. It’s better than nothing, I guess.

This week in sports has been a real game-changer in many ways.  For instance, the NBA, MLB and NHL have all announced plans (or potential plans) to resume play before the end of the 2020 season. But the biggest sports news came in the NFL and it was three-fold: 1. Drew Brees reigniting the flag controversy by conflating peaceful protest with lack of patriotism; 2. Drew Brees being rebuked by many across the sports world and walking those remarks back and apologizing not once, not twice, but three times, for his ignorance on the subject matter; and 3. the NFL issuing a formal apology to its players and its fans for not listening to the players, nor supporting them, while they exercised their constitutional right to peacefully protest police brutality of black Americans by taking a knee during the national anthem.

And all of the above happened during a week of global and national peaceful protests  (and some not-so-peaceful ones) in over 30 cities nationwide over the last 7 days, in response to the murder of George Floyd — at the hands of Minneapolis policemen.  And by mid-week, all four officers had been arrested and held on murder charges. But there is also an under-current of hope that this horrific crime, caught on videotape, would serve as the catalyst for real change in racial justice and in the fight against racism. 

The NFL’s move has been met with lots of skepticism because it took so long for this epiphany, and its inaction (or deliberate efforts some believe) ended quarterback  Colin Kapernick’s once promising career. But the conversations around race relations in sports have been poignant and need to continue. And my senior memories will forever be etched in history as culminating alongside a pandemic that disproportionately kills black people and the murder of an unarmed black man.  Pittstop does not regret these parallels though it wishes none of these incidents had occurred. But if it means the disparities in black America versus white America are exposed — from health care, to housing, to education, to policing — and that exposure leads to meaningful change, then, maybe, when we look back at 2020 years from now, maybe our country’s wounds will be less fatal.