Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays.

I remember as a kid, my mother would assign me tasks that I hated to do.  I would put the short ones off until the last minute and would whine and grump through the bigger ones making them last longer than necessary.  As I finished each task, it wouldn't seem as bad as I had made it out to be and was almost used to it by the end.  That seems to be the way of this past year.

As the holidays came closer and closer this year, I worried what they would look like.  Who would I be able to see, and how could I see them safely?  Who could I celebrate with and not put my family at risk?  It all worked out alright.  People came for a quick safe visit in small groups and we did our holidays (fingers crossed so far) virus free.  I woke up Christmas morning and did my chores (feeding the dogs, making a fire, making coffee for my mother) and enjoyed the peace of the day.  My mother and I shared a quiet time together and spoke of past years.  This year was very different but in the end, not as bad as our fears made it out to be.

Fear is the catch phrase of the day.  What do we fear?  Why do we let fear build up the worst in our mind and predict such dire situations?  Please don't think I am going to down play the virus, nor the economic impact of it.  These are serious concerns but, like most of these situations; we don't really know what it is going to be until we are standing in it.

I will make a prediction; the future is what we want it to be.  We all have hopes and desires for the new year.  No one really knows what it will be but it will be different than our expectations because of what we want it to be.  Do we want to do art shows in the coming year?  If that is what we want, we will figure out a way to make it happen.  
 

I have seen it happen, even subconsciously; we will work toward our greatest desire.  That push we feel in our gut to go left instead of right? That is our subconscious pushing us the way we really want to go.  Our success or failure can be traced to how much we want something. Our ability to adapt to a certain crap storm can also be traced to that.  I will admit, things are pretty bad right now.  I have found myself becoming accustomed to the new normal.  I wash my face masks daily, stay home a lot, use curbside service when I can, and call my friends often.  It isn't what I want, but I want to stay safe and healthy more.  I want to make it to the spring where I know I want to do shows again.  I want to see my friends again and because of my wants, I am getting used to the Now.

In the aftermath, things will never be the same again but I think we lie to ourselves when we talk about the "Way it was".  Nothing ever stays the same, we are always in transition.  Something small and large will always adjust the way things go and sometimes we don't know it was any different until we look back. My advice? Keep looking forward.....