You remember the pandemic shut down, don't you?

At first, they called it sheltering in place.

That was an interesting phrase that evoked a cozy snow day mixed with some cold war duck

and cover.

It was later on they took to calling it a shutdown, even a lockdown.

Whatever name you prefer, this extraordinary event produced a massive spike in certain

behaviors.

We all learned to conduct our business on Zoom.

Everyone in Brooklyn learned to bake sourdough bread.

There were runs on jigsaw puzzles and peloton bikes, but there were darker sides too

of all this staying at home.

As many people stay home to stay safe, that can be the worst place to be for victims

of domestic violence.

Organizations aiming to prevent violence say this is a particularly scary time for victims

who may be forced to stay home with their abusers.

Domestic violence surges during COVID-19 pandemic.

That was an NBC news headline in May of 2020 and you could find similar headlines pretty

much everywhere.

And there were other dark headlines, even aside from the pandemic itself.

We were told that suicides would spike and that birth rates would plummet.

All these predictions had a certain logic around them.

The pandemic was a sudden, unprecedented tragedy and of course it would produce additional

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