Well, 2020 has been replete with crapulescence.

But, wouldn’t you know it, the ancient Chinese had a method of contextualizing these events. 天干地支, the Heavenly Stems and Earthly Branches, is a system of ordinals dating back to the Shang Dynasty. It combines ten Chinese characters (Heavenly Stems) representing a celestial cycle with twelve Chinese characters (Earthly Branches) representing a terrestrial cycle. The Heavenly Stems and Earthly Branches combine to create sixty possible two-character words. They can be used, and continue to be utilized in much of Asia, to rank, denote, and classify many things. These ordinals are used to create a sixty-year cycle.

In 庚子 years momentous events happen. A hundred and eighty years ago (3 cycles of 60 years) was the beginning of the First Opium War. Sixty years later began the Boxer Rebellion. Sixty years ago was the Great Chinese Famine. I know the examples are sinocentric, but it’s their system.

The year 2020 is both a rat year and a 庚子 year, magnifying the effect of each and creating a perfect celestial shitstorm. This year brought COVID-19, a trade war, financial crisis, worldwide civil unrest, flooding in Southern China, and Trump being even more Trumpy.

For me, 2020 brings to mind the Chinese curse: may you live in interesting times. This year’s been riveting—it is hard to take your eyes off world events. When the planet finally emerges from lockdown it’ll be surprising the changes the 庚子 year has wrought. Interesting times indeed.