Last year was a which-way year. This one is fixin’ to become the same. It’s been going every which way in both luck and troubles. Allow me to explain.
I don’t really get why people are so excited about New Year’s. It’s not like things are any different from last week to this one, the gospel, according to my twelve year old.
I smirked a bit on account of, well, she wasn’t wrong.
True. Some see it as a fresh start or a personal deadline - that little date on the calendar. Things change for all of us - on a date, in a day, a breath, a wink, a moment, over a year, or complete and utterly altogether in a split second. Then again, sometimes they don’t seem to change one damn bit.
It’s going to be another crappy year; from the mouths of babes.
It’s going to get worse before it gets any better, bee. Yeah. You’re right. But…
How can you promise you’d give what you can of the whole world to her, while you’re incapable of changing the worst, most inevitable, parts of it right there within arm’s reach?
It will get better - because, well, there’s no other which way it can go from here. Really.
It’s been scientifically proven. Sure.
You just hope a little, hold your breath a lot - and hang in there like all those kitty posters, circa 1980’s, that school counselor offices implored you to.
My mom passed away too fast in 2021, and then there’s my father - passing away too damn slow in the here and now. Long running, yet (mostly) reliably stagnant illness for the former, and a chameleon ALS diagnosis for the latter. It both hit our already (death and spite reduced) little family like a ton of bricks only months ago, and played out like a tiresome game of Tuesday night Clue with a litany of oh yeah’s, and so that’s what it musta been’s, when all other sources of functional loss were ruled out and paralysis began to set in.
We lost most of our family already when mom died. She was wrongfully admired for keeping broken pieces and people together that should have been swept up and discarded for being jagged and dangerous a long while ago. The people they were once before have been long dead and buried by their own hateful efforts. So while I composed and presented one eulogy, I finally began to draft a good eleven more for people who hadn’t even died yet with many cathartic tears and one resolute thought: I’m not going to live this way anymore. I am nothing like them.
Never been.
Would never be.
Cosmically speaking though, and I mean no disrespect to the powers that be, I would very much like to speak to someone in charge.
Though, I admit, while I remain on hold - we are a resilient people. Tired and guarded some, sure, but so thankful for our found family, our friends, and those special folk we meet along the way. You counted among them, in fact, dear patron and reader. Thank you for making me smile. Thank you for graciously encouraging me to take up space, however brief, in your consideration.
So I continue to create when I can with every intention to work through this long, strange - and yet still sudden - phase of anticipatory grief. The current daily forecast has been a bit stormy and unpredictable. By the time there is quiet from the rolling thunders of estate obligations, and a ceaseless call log from hospice nurses and aides, and ‘final arrangements,’ I find myself using that time to eat, sleep, or get in a good hour of wall staring in. My little fortune stones are quietly waiting to be summoned and poured, polished, or painted. I have so many that are, and so many more that are waiting to be. They’re waiting for fairer skies and idle coffee mornings too.
And I know they're there. In stolen hours, yes, but also in better days ahead. Those days that are due to be better because there ain't no other which-way about it. It's just, things are going to get worse first. That's the catch with luck and fortune though. There's a flip side, always, but we're due for a flip. We just don't know when - but it's likely gonna' be soon.
This Which-Way year has been a hard pill to swallow, so far. Same as the two before. That’s for damn sure. But, while there is no celebratory mark on any paper - I know it will get better. Because, well, there’s no other which-way it can go from here. It’s been scientifically proven.