Also 2016 seemed to reap more than its fair share of celebrities. It began with David Bowie in January and continued on through Prince and Alan Rickman and Gene Wilder and Glen Frey and Gary Shandling and Florence Henderson and Zsa Zsa Gabor and Anton Yeltchin and Mohamed Ali and George Michael...I mean, it started to feel like my childhood companions were all disappearing to heaven. Certainly none of those hit quite as personally as the ones just after Christmas - Princess Leia herself, Carrie Fisher, died three days after suffering a major heart attack on a plane. I was in total shock. And that shock was heightened the next day when her mother, Debbie Reynolds, also passed away. She had a stroke and followed her daughter...the very next day. To lose the women from two of my all-time favorite movies, Star Wars and then Singing in the Rain....well, my childhood did suffer some losses.
I know there were other crappy things too - by the end of December I seemed to hear that from lots of folks around me. "This year just sucks!" and "I hate 2016!" And it was a hard year for me in some ways too - mostly focused around my mother's health and my dad's subsequent difficult time trying to cope with it all. Moving my mom into her village in February was hard, and the months of her going steadily down hill since then. My sister moving away was another challenge. Troy's job was no picnic either, though I'm happy to announce that he's starting with a new job next week. Fingers crossed and prayers being uttered for his happiness and success there.
I kind of feel like sticking up for 2016. It wasn't her fault it was such a hard year, right? I guess I feel like 2016 needed to be a year of grace, of getting through hard things. And there were many beautiful and good things too. 2017, here's to you, may you be the year of strength and momentum that I feel you could be.
