So, 2020 24 hours to go. (I wanna be sedated...) This year we saw a global pandemic that has taken 1.8 million lives and has grounded our businesses to a trickle, not to mention racial strife and mistrust among our fellow Americans splitting our country due to so many compounded injustices and perceptions. Politics has sunk to a new low as many Americans seem emboldened to show you just how much they don't care about anyone else whatsoever. Our entitlement is showing, and it's an ugly self portrait.
So yes--get lost 2020! We need 2021 to be our fresh start, right? (Pandemics don't have calendars, though) But I'm really trying not to be negative here. That won't help. I want to reflect and be thankful on the good. My family is healthy and safe, we're both still working, and our needs continue to be met. I have friends who lost some and even all of these things this year.
So much loss this year. A couple of months ago, my sweet mother passed away after a long struggle with an illness. I had to shut down that whole corner of my life that has been closing for years now. I have very little in the way of ties to my hometown and have fewer and fewer seasonal phone calls to make now. I still pick up the phone to call her out of habit, and I wonder when that will stop happening. Do I want that to stop happening?
So what I am thankful for then? The thing that comes easily to mind for me is that I got to say goodbye to her. I was able to leave work long enough to sit by her bedside for almost a week and lead her in worship once more time. I got to leave it all on the table for her, and I was able to get a measure of closure in knowing I was saying goodbye. I didn't get that when my father passed, and the gift I had in precious time with her is something completely priceless and timeless to me. Folks, say what you need to say. It's vital. It's imperative. It's good!
We are only given so much time and we can whine about zoom meetings and leftovers and lost time at the bar, or we can fire up the smoker, put on a record, or just create something. (working on that) We get what we get, and we don't throw a fit. The kids might have heard that a few thousand times now.
Life is finite, and perhaps that's part of what gives it meaning. It's flying by, and bad things are built into this broken world. Don't let the good stuff get covered up by the drama and noise from the events of the days. Claim the good and recognize it when it comes. And cling tightly to sweet memories and good times, because folks- life is a vapor. As fellow great American and poet David Lee Roth sang in the last Van Halen record where he really tried to sing well,
"Better keep that in mind
When we say our goodbyes
'Cause you can't get this stuff no more."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3HHQ11HOZwM
(That's the song)
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