On Looking Back

     A new year is upon us. For many it is a time to make "resolutions" and for others it is just a point in time to look forward from. The tricky part is remembering to look back without dwelling on the past. It is a point to learn from and a place to see where thing are changing. While thinking back over this past year, I started to make the mistake of lingering on the negative. It took me going up to my home state and visiting not only with family, but reconnecting with friends and acquaintances from my more distant past before I saw how positive the year really was. From there I thought that the best way to write about it is to just go ahead and list those focus points. The following is somewhat in order and have a positive, negative or both sign after them to show how they were perceived:

• A online friendship renewed along with a lesson in forgive-and-forget +
• The first draft of Midnight to Morning was finished +
• I had several major lessons in the power of prayer +
• The dog who had been wandering the neighborhood and we had been working with became ours when the people who had been "feeding it" moved. +
• The garden was started early indoors and 90% of it was a success +
• All early crops went in on-time and the harvest was beyond expectations+
• Edits were being done to Midnight to Morning +-
• The virtual world of New Kestic (SWG) was thriving and although it was stressful, in-character time and stories were near constant +-
• Smaller compression garments for the lymphedema + Being in those garments -
• The SI joint in my left hip tore out again, with no way to call out on the long-term position I was in -
• It was four days before the joint popped back in again -
• An over-demanding friendship had to be critically damaged. There was no other way to get the person to see the levels of emotional frustration caused on top of the physical pain. -
• The garden continued to thrive despite the long periods of neglect while I was on my back +
• Surviving the rest of the school year while teaching in 3 different rooms on 2 separate floors and hobbling around with a cane +-
• Once school was out, and I was confined to the couch for six weeks, the depression kicked in...and it stayed all summer long -
• Feeling isolated due to the injury preventing a trip to see family, friends not returning calls, IM's etc -
• More lessons in prayer and learning to be perceptive to that whisper of a voice +
• Canning, drying, freezing the garden bounty +
• The announcement was made that SWG was being shut down in December -
• Learning to live with a cane at age 33-
• A very dear online friend pointed out my poor attitude, lack of hope and prideful compensating. It was like a slap to the face and I became determined to get myself out +
• School started back up again, despite the "Shake and Lake" (earthquake and hurricane) +
• The virtual world continued to thrive and the damaged friendship started to heal +
• 9 months after starting edits it was finished. The cover was designed and the book went "live" +
• Stories were finished, contacts were exchanged, goodbyes were said, and SWG was taken down -
• Seeing that the year, although difficult due to my health and loss of creative outlet, was really one of growth ++