Punctuation and Goodbyes.

Part of the aim of all of this, I suppose is to put a period on the end of last year.  I don't do much of the New Year's resolution thing.  It usually ends in disappointment and I don't need any of that.  I'd simply like to de-clutter and simplify, laugh and love much, give thanks and positive energy.  Things that should just be a continuation and not something new.  A tall order?  Maybe, but with the New Year, I'll just remind myself to keep trying. 

Sooo, in case you didn't know...2010 had some rough spots that I'd very much like to put in the past. Put a period on it and start a new chapter.  Learn my lessons and move on.   I've learned plenty of lessons and plan to fine tune them for the future.  I guess that's where the older and wiser statement kicks in.  I'm on the verge of older and wiser is a work in progress.   Part of my process of figuring things out, searching for answers, has become to take walks.  Some are longer than others but even the short jaunts help relax me.   I've done a lot of walking around the neighborhood this fall and always come home with a clearer head than when I left the house. 

My longest walk happend last week, Wednesday before Christmas.  A friend of mine passed after a very hard fought battle with cancer.  She has 3 kids and as a matter of fact, her oldest one turned 8 today.  It wasn't a surprise when she died but no less sad or difficult.  She was a great lady and my only regret is that I didn't get to spend more time with her.  She was in and out? of my life... just like that.  Precious time and now fond memories.  I held out through the day and I think around 8pm I couldn't stand it any more and had to take that walk.  I cried my way around the neighborhood in the freezing temperatures, trying to get it all out.  Thinking about her and her family and me and my family and the events of the past year.  Angry at everything and thinking how I can't wait for this year to be over and her passing now was like a symbolic last "ha ha!" right in the face.   One last dig from the b***h I sometimes call Karma.  The exclamation point on the end of the year.  I walked fast and long and only stopped crying about 2/3 of the way around.  I saw a lot of twinkling Christmas lights in the sleepy neighborhood.  I guess over all, it helped remind me that despite it all, everything would come back around to normal eventually.  Christmas will come, the year will end and hopefully a new and exciting chapter will start.  Learn from the past and move on.  Goodbye 2010.  Put a period on that.