The Fourth of July is going to feel weird this year. Several years ago we moved to a house very close to the parade route of a neighborhood Fourth of July parade that has been a mainstay for decades. We turned these morning parades into our own tradition. We would invite any of our friends who were hardy enough to wake up and come over for a 9am parade on a day off, serve bagels, breakfast tacos, coffee, juice and/or mimosas, and watch the various scout troops, school and civic groups, and the famous Lawn Chair Brigade march by while enjoying the reverie and each other’s company. Not this year. Add this disappointment to the mountains of missed graduations, cancelled proms, deferred vacations and postponed plans great and small that we have all lost to the pandemic. Worse still, there appears to be no end in sight. The best hope we are given is that a safe and effective vaccine will be developed, tested, approved and made available “soon”.