Community.
This little village of ours has been around a long time by American standards. Which means that we still are fortunate enough to have connections to our past here in the present (some of which I wrote about at length in the book). Today I am grateful for both that past and present - for the winding gravel roads and rolling farms around the village preserved by many, which offer welcome relief and solace as well as exercise for many of us go out walking.
And in the village proper, where our Facebook-connected present and our 100-150-year-old houses built close to the road means that neighbors can all go out on their porches at 5pm on a Friday to wave at the passers-by - on foot or in vehicles coming home from their essential work. Refusing to let our physical separation keep us from being a community of humans.
Lincoln is a special and unique place, but I'd be willing to be it's like thousands of other places right now - where neighbors are doing their best to look after each other and wave from a pandemically-safe distance. Somehow we will be the ones to get us through all of this. And for that, as well as the quiet rural beauty of home, I am indeed deeply #grateful.