2021 is finally arriving and I’ve been pondering what good I can salvage from the wreckage of 2020? What do I want to leave behind? What do I want to keep? What will I do differently? In past years, my New Year’s resolutions have focused on me: Diets and exercise plans to make me healthier, budgets to improve my bank account, new systems to help me get more organized. But this past year, I have become acutely and humbly aware of how very much my life is interconnected with everyone and everything else on this planet. While I may feel insignificant sometimes, I have realized that my actions during this pandemic—even seemingly small irrelevant choices like whether to go to the store, or take a plane trip, or spend a holiday with those I love—could have enormous and even deadly consequences for everyone around me.

So this year, I’m making a different resolution—one focused on helping our planet and my community (as well as my waistline)—by cycling more and driving less. And I would be delighted to have some company. While there have been many terrible costs of the coronavirus this year, one positive outcome has been the enormous number of people who have started cycling and walking and getting outdoors.  What if we could continue this momentum after the pandemic ends and keep on biking and getting outdoors each day rather than jumping back into our cars and returning to the same chaotic, unhealthy lifestyle we had before?

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