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May tomorrow be a perfect day May you find love and laughter along the way May God keep you in his tender care ‘Til he brings us together again

–  “Donny and Marie” theme song

This is my annual reflection before my birthday. After a year where many optimistically wish that flipping the calendar alone drives away the misfortunes of the past 12 months, there is still much to be grateful for, perhaps grudgingly.

2020 started with great optimism, and for this writer, finally co-authoring a sports book. An old saying goes that in his lifetime, a man should plant a tree, write a book and have a son. I finally ticked off the last item on the list. I had contributed to several books before, but this one had my name on it. Thanks to The Philippines Yearbook.

Then the world stopped, and nobody really knew how to deal with it. In many ways, sports suffered most because it has always been deemed a luxury or a non-necessity, just leisure. What’s a sports journalist to do when there are no sports? Many did personality profiles, digging into the past, seeking out even second-tier athletes to stir some discussion. Others changed jobs or platforms. Sports was at a standstill. Who was going to make the first move towards normalcy? Surely this was temporary.

Then, even the Olympics was postponed, by a full year. Now, Tokyo cannot afford to move the Games back any further, because the International Olympic Committee may cancel them altogether. The Winter Olympics are already set for 2022 in Beijing. (What an irony that is.) Needless to say, this impacts all the plans of sports journalists of every media.

Despite the deep melancholy forced by isolation, there was opportunity to resurge, reinvent, rediscover, refresh. We exchanged ideas, gathered best practices, learned from each other without judgment or prejudice. For some athletes, living elsewhere to train because travel was restricted became necessary. So much change happened so fast, we had no time to mourn who we were before the pandemic. And when we lost people, the threat of an invisible virus made it impractical to even commiserate with one another in person. And we lost so many, many unexpected, like we were being punched out in a corner, unable to lift our hands in self-defense. Each death seemed to hurt that much more.

And yet, we look forward with hope. For this writer, the hope is to return to the Olympics after a quarter of a century; to finally visit Japan and Vietnam, where the SEA Games will be. Also to revive my beloved Hardball, and to launch a new project that has never been done before, a habit that never gets old. Lastly, the hope is to strengthen ties with family, perhaps the most sorely hit by the separation. Yes, that list would be a great birthday gift.

One can only hope.