Before I start the New Year...

It takes a lot of thought and even more patience to clear out the past and start on a new path to wherever the fates have decided your footfalls ought to leave their mark.
I know that statement smacks of determinism, but then again I have come to believe that we can't completely disassociate ourselves from the world around us and live in Waldenesque existence; besides, I don't have any friends that even remotely remind me of Emerson and I don't want to live away from the ones I have.
I can't say that last year was all that great. Although I am certain that I fared better than many I had way too many things to deal with to be able to enjoy life as it was meant to be enjoyed.

Rocks are put in the road for many reasons, many of which I have yet to comprehend, but I figure that I have, through my limited experience, garnered some of the purpose by which obstacles might be considered more than just a mere inconvenience.
The barriers that we encounter are just one of the ways that life makes up for the effects of the continuous depreciation in the gene pool. Those who overcome are allowed to continue on and deal with the next set of encounters and are given the privilege of taking care of those who couldn't or wouldn't.
I am starting to digress into an altogether different subject and I must reserve those thoughts for another day.
Life is hard and it should be so. Put simply, it looks and feels better to say it that way than to break out a lot of ten dollar words that confusticate and bewilder rather than enlighten and clear out the underbrush of weeds and dead branches that make travelling troublesome.

Wrestling with the surprises and curve balls of the last twelve months and especially of recent happenings has left me more than just tired. It has rendered me listless and withdrawn. Those of you who have tangled with your own demons are sure to understand what I am talking about.
The only good thing that I can say about having surpassed the trials and tribulations that befell me is that I can only experience them once. Any other loss that comes my way cannot effect me in the same way as this has.
For the past ten days or more, I really have lost count, I have wrapped myself in a blanket of memories and hope. Trying to look into the past and the future all at the same time.
I don't want to forget the pain of my past nor avoid the anguish that passing time will eventually deliver into my life. I just want to learn from it- for it to make some kind of sense and bring me closer to understanding the why.

Next time I'll try to talk about the new year and what I hope to do with it.