EUGENE, Ore. — Change is a, perhaps the, only constant in the short time we have to draw breath on Planet Earth.

A day like Monday served as a reminder of how each and all of us is living through a powerful current of change, amplified and accelerated by the pandemic. There is no going back to the way things were.

And that’s OK.

Because it’s OK to consider, for instance, a new way, or ways, of things. In particular, ways sport can help us see differently.

Sport is a prism through which we often can find constructive dialogue about things that sometimes can prove too fraught otherwise. These possibilities drew Monday into sharp relief, underscored not only by racing at the U.S. track and field Trials here at Hayward Field in Eugene but by events in Washington and across the world.