A lot can happen in a year. You can learn you’re pregnant and have a baby within that time span. You can get a divorce or travel the entire globe. Or, if you’re like most people trudging along with their lives lately, you can spend a whole year grappling with the effects of a pandemic. Whether you’ve been working remotely, attempting to homeschool your kids, unemployed, or fighting the virus firsthand in hospitals, this year has taken a toll on everyone. There’s the quarantine 15 (or 20), bad haircuts, newfound agoraphobia, and, of course, living much of your social and work life through choppy and unnecessary Zoom calls.
While we were trying not to think about the passing of time and this increasingly depressing period of stasis, people on Twitter are facing the sad truth head on via memes. The glumly relatable memes compare March 1st 2020 and March 1st 2021 with painful accuracy. They’re the exact opposite of a glow-up. But at least they’re a great reminder that we’re far from alone in this monotonous struggle. Fingers crossed things don’t get worse by next March. We can’t handle seeing a bleak three panel progression.