Johnston Now Honors goes virtual

In a year in which time has lost its normal meaning, perhaps it’s not really all that strange that we’re celebrating Johnston Now Honors, presented by our friends at Johnston Health, in October instead of July.

Tell me if you’ve heard this before: We had big plans for 2020.

We had grand visions of gathering at the Clayton Center, rolling out the red carpet and shining a positive light on these 12 deserving individuals.

Well, we kicked the can as long as we could. But it doesn’t look like four or five hundred of us are going to be hanging out together indoors anytime soon.

So, in our usual fashion, we decided to improvise. The magazine looks very much like it always has for Honors. We have a feature story and photos on each winner, and I lament the fact that I only had 900 words or so to write about some of our winners.

What will look different is the awards ceremony. We asked our winners to record acceptance speeches, and our award sponsors graciously agreed to record introductions for them as well. If you visit www.johnstonnow.com or our Facebook page, you’ll find a link to the awards video we put together.

It’s the closest thing we can get to an awards ceremony right now. On the bright side, everyone still got a cool trophy.

We know it’s not a perfect solution, but it’s one that helps us stay in line with CDC guidelines. This year, that’s really all you can ask for.

We look forward to — at some point — honoring this year’s class with a VIP reception, and, of course, we all have our fingers crossed for 2021.

Until then, join me in congratulating this year’s honorees.