Well I am looking forward to a new year and what ever that will bring. These last couple days I have been hold up on the couch with a sinus cold and thinking back on the year. What my goals were, did I achieve them, what my goals are, how will I achieve them. You know the usual….
2023, farewell I say. I watched two friends lose their husbands much much too soon, and my Grandpa passed away, the last patriarch in my family. He was 93 years old, but I really just thought he would be the one who lived forever. We didn’t have a close relationship, my whole life he lived in another country, he would show up in a whirl wind of a couple days once a year or so and that was about it, sometimes he would call me on my birthday. Once when I was about 4 years old, my sister Jamie and I were going to stay over night with him at his house that he kept in town for his infrequent visits to Fort Fraser. We stopped off at our cousins house to say hello and Jamie slammed my thumb in the car door. I had to go to the clinic, he did not drive me there but instead took me back home to my Mom first, that was probably wise on his part. I still have the scar. He always had Orange sorbet in his freezer when he came to visit and it was the only time I ever ate it, like it was special just from Grandpa even tho I could buy it at anytime.
Jamie and I visited him in Portugal when I was 22 and Jamie was 23. He was proud of us that much we always knew. He was not the best tour guild…as in he never told us where we were going, how long we would be gone for and what to bring, he would simply clap his hands and say “girls get in the car”, and we did. Grandpa and Grandma Carolina had their passports stolen before we had arrived so we needed to go to the embassy to get them new ones, Jamie and I got reminiscing about our childhood and were tear streaming laughing while we waited in the completely empty waiting room at the embassy, Grandpa made us sit on opposite sides of the room because we were causing a fuss. I still find that very funny, partly because we did it, we stopped laughing and sat on opposite sides of the room.
He made all the effort to nurture the relationship we did have. He came to all the big milestone events in my life and I don’t feel like our relationship was somehow lacking tho I will aways wish I knew him better. During the Covid years he called every couple weeks to check in and even learned the What’s App so we could video chat. He was an adventurer and he had a big life, he was a big presence and was loved and respected and that era is now over, 2023.
Usually I am optimistic about the new year rolling in, and its not that I am not this year, maybe its because I am sick, maybe because the world is in a mess, as I have everything to be thankful for and I am, truly thankful. My family, my puppy, my extended family, my framily, our health, as we enter in to this new year ahead I hope for more adventures and time to absorb what is most important.
My words of wisdom to myself for 2024 is just to slow down and be present. I suffer from always looking ahead when I should just be looking around. I wish that for you all as well.
