My daughter gets her car inspected, but the mechanic has no inspection stickers. The stickers aren’t here yet, he explains. She texts me this, asking, What am I supposed to do?

Nothing, I answer. The stickers will come in when they come.

That sums up a strand of 2021 — there’s plenty more to this year, oh, boy, is there plenty more — but doing nada is definitely a 2021 strand. I’m not much for new year’s resolutions. I’m a compulsive list writer, and I tend to get a chunk of the stuff right before my eyes done. But there’s rain forecast for New Year’s Day when a deep freeze generally sets in. The world around us is unraveling.

This afternoon, I drove to the high school to pick up a rapid test for my daughter. The health department had taken over the parking lot with orange cones and bright vests. The tests were gone, of course. I talked with the health department employee for a few moments. He raised his hands, palms up, to the twilight settling in.

We commiserated about the strangeness of March weather in late December. Then I drove around him and headed home.

Small stuff. Big stuff. Proportion matters.