I really want to write about happy things.

After my last post, I thought, enough. Enough griping and whining. Enough talking about how terribly hard it all is. Enough feeling sorry for myself.

Let us talk of cheerful things again. Music, and magic, and art. Dreams for the future, hopes for my children, little moments that make life wonderful. Cake, and friendship, and how cute Yetis are.

However. Twenty twenty-four is just not working with me. It is not ON BOARD with this plan.

Around Christmas, my previously healthy mother was diagnosed with Stage 4 Pancreatic Cancer. It’s only been a few weeks but we are already at the point of palliative care.

About the same time, we found out my oldest kid, Captain Jelly Belly, would be having surgery this spring for an ongoing medical condition that will require several months of recovery and physiotherapy.

Meanwhile, I got the flu, only it was some kind of Devil Germ that went rogue and caused a liver infection that landed me in the hospital for a couple of days, and I’m still struggling to recover from it now.

Did I mention I started a new job and also bought a house in there too?

January was, shall we say, challenging.

But I continue to cling to the resolution of cheer, peace, good things. I am doing my best to look up, look forward, and find the beautiful. I’m reading a lot of good books. I’m drinking a lot of tea and cherishing the quiet moments that being forced to rest have brought to me. I’m looking back at family memories and feeling so, so lucky to have sisters to go through this with.

I’m gathering my strength and getting ready to fight my way to the calm that will inevitably arise after the storm.

So let’s not call this post yet another in my long line of gripes and whines. Let’s call this post The Last Of An Age. The last marker of a bad time, the in-like-a-lion, out-like-a-lamb stylings of the year 2024.

Next time you see me, I’ll be smiling.