2015

What can I say about 2015? It was a year. It was a very year-like year, in that it had 365 days, divided into 12 more or less equal portions. On those days, many things happened. Some were bad things that turned out to be good, which was a relief. Some were bad things that stayed bad, which was unfortunate. Thankfully all of the good things that happened stayed good–none turned out to be, on later reflection, bad things.

Among the 365 dinners, lunches, and breakfasts consumed, hundreds of school days successfully prepared for and attended, dozen or so not attended, nights of more or less restful sleep, and other such mundanities, which even I yawn to remember, things happened which were not in the slightest mundane.

We exchanged a nightmare of a government for a government which seems, in its early days, to be at the very least fully awake and conscious of its surroundings. This is a positive development.

We had our hearts broken approximately 152 times apiece over the Syrian refugee crisis. Cumulative tears spilled over pictures of dead children on beaches and HONY’s ongoing refugee stories surely number in the billions. Scientists are still trying to account for the water usage in global models of rising sea levels. Further, we had the opportunity to discover which, of our friends, had been for many years absolute racists right under our very noses. We learned that the human capacity for hatred of other humans in distress remains tragically high in western culture, despite all the progress made in human rights and diversity over the past few decades. This struck a real blow to our collective hubris but not, alas, in the right quarters.

We learned that there are far too many people who are willing to support politicians and parties who build their platforms out of the wood of hate-trees, but not, in Canada at least, enough of them to win those politicians an election. Fingers crossed, America.

There were also events which were neither global nor national in scope. Some of them involved pieces of fabric which were assembled by hand or machine into various textile goods. However, in amongst navigating daily life and large piles of fabric, hugs were exchanged, tears fell, jobs were lost and gained, genetic conditions were considered and dismissed (all of them, in fact), deadlines were missed, bills were paid, cancer diagnoses were confirmed, birthday parties were held, friends were entertained and/or consoled as seemed appropriate; in short, it was a year. A year in which 365 days were experienced in a consecutive fashion, much like most other years. A year in which night followed day, which followed night, with periods of twilight mixed in for aesthetic impact. A year in which one person’s best day ever was someone else’s worst day ever, and most of us found ourselves squarely in between. A year in which beauty and ugliness were, as usual, so thoroughly co-mingled in most situations and places that there was no separating them.

2015: It was here. Now it is not.

2016: 365 days plus a freebie. Let’s see what we can do with this one.