Oh, It Matters‪.‬ Annie Hodges

Coronavirus Series, Part IV: COMMUNITY. THE LAST COVID EPISODE!! Finally. Thanks for letting me drag this series out for over a year now. On this episode, Steve Greer is here to take us home. In the first half of the episode (recorded in March), my dad boldly claims that covid will have a larger historical impact than 9/11, and I stupidly ignore him. We discuss house-flipping during a pandemic, letting fear play a role in our decision-making, weathering hard times, election anticipation, and the ups and downs of learning to live with his adult children again. And we end the whole thing with the inspirational dad pep talk that we all need to hear for 2021.

Coronavirus Series, Part IV: COMMUNITY. Kristen Richey returns! If you’ve been curious about how coronavirus affected the dental industry, this is the episode for you. Kristen also discusses her ups and downs experiencing covid as an extrovert and how boundaries can set you free. We also discuss how a simple party invitation is now a deep moral dilemma.

Today, I get a social person’s perspective on the inner battle that has occurred over the course of this year of isolation and solitude. My friend Sarah Burger and I talk about the power of ego in our lives, the “why” behind our mechanisms of control, where we are finding our joy, and the restorative power of walks. We debate whether we’ll be in a sweaty crowd ever again, and we obsess over our love for the liturgical calendar and the rhythm it brings into our lives.

In the last mental health episode of the series, we get very vulnerable. Specifically, my sister Kate Greer gets very vulnerable. We discuss body image, attaching your identity to your goals, the anxiety surrounding her post-grad future, and the ups and downs of navigating uncertainty. At the end of the episode, we check in with Kate four months later to see how her coronavirus story has unfolded this year.

Coronavirus Series, Part III: MENTAL HEALTH. Carly Sullins is a ray of sunshine. Ever since I met her, she has inspired me to choose joy on a daily basis. But what happens when the sunshine runs out? In today’s episode, I have two conversations with Carly, each 5 months apart, discussing the ups and downs of “maintaining the sunshine”. We discuss our sine and cosine theory of mental health, our blindly ambitious coronavirus goals, and the importance of puzzles.

After a brief (read: long) hiatus, the coronavirus series is back. Each episode remaining in this series will include a flashback conversation and a present day conversation on how coronavirus has changed my guests over time. This episode kicks off our third “theme” of the series, which is mental health. Haven Wahl filed for unemployment at 23, something she never could have imagined. We talk about how her unemployment affected her mental health, whether or not having extra time on your hands can help or hurt your mentality, and what coronavirus has taught us about jeans.