Live Together, See Together, Know Together

My guess is we are all trying to figure out how to make sense of this new reality in which we find ourselves.  Recently I read an interesting linguistic take on the word COVID. Co means together, something we do with others, like cooperate, cohabitate, coordinate.  Vid has different meanings in different languages.  In Spanish it means living.  In Latin it means seeing.  And in Sanskrit it means knowing.  So let’s think about ways that we are living together, seeing together and knowing together during these times of Covid.

I imagine we are all seeing things a bit, or maybe a lot, differently than we used to.  Perhaps we have more time to look at (and listen to) things, even if doing so remotely. Check these out:

• The Cornell Botanic Gardens is joyful!  Seeing is not just what your eyes see but how you think about what you are seeing.  Daily, we see the beauty of the human spirit with outpourings of love and care, the sharing of art and music and support for the vulnerable.  Together we see more than just ourselves and that is beautiful.
• Our classmate Julie Kane’s poem “Used Book” was featured this week on Garrison Keillor’s The Writer’s Almanac.
• The Cornell Hangovers–I Won’t Give Up (Alumni Quarantine Edition.

“Knowing together”, as schools and universities are closed, takes on a whole new meaning.  Interestingly, Cornell has been a pioneer in distance learning for the past 130 years.  Read this fascinating account of our history of remote learning. Pictured here is Martha Van Rensselaer.  She pioneered the study of home economics and distance learning in 1990 with a correspondence course she designed for famers’ wives.  This led to more courses, a department, a school and a college.

So even though we are apart, we are all in this together–living, seeing and knowing– and from that we can draw strength!  Please continue to keep in touch and share your joys or your sadness or your thoughts with each other and on our class Facebook group.

Please be well!