2009 in Review

Ralph: Just remember, you can't put you arms around a memory.
Alice: I can't even put my arms around you.

--The Honeymooners, "Better Living Through Television" (11/12/55)

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This is a post that changed very quickly from idea to execution. The original intent was to do a fun recap of some of the news events that took place this year, but as I began to do some of the research involved, it came to me that most of the stuff that was newsworthy wasn't really worth writing punch lines about. Some of them were already punch lines, in fact; they were kind of tough to top. 

The other thing that happened was a weird little confluence of events that took place this past week. It started with a joke that I'd posted to Facebook: 

It sucks that someday I'm gonna die, and people will gather, and they'll all say nice things about me, and I won't be there to hear it. And the big shame is that I'll have missed it by only a couple of days.

This was a paraphrase of something I'd nicked from Garrison Keillor. It was one of those little absurdities that amused me, so I tweaked it and posted it. Unfortunately, I actually wound up worrying a few people, especially when my next post started to move into the medical tests I was going through. That engendered another rash of comments, some of which were general "good luck to ye" comments, some of which were "I've been there, you'll be fine" comments, and a few which were more in the "don't go dying on us" realm. 

These comments, all of them, took me to a different place. It was a place where I wasn't soliciting comfort, or encouragement, or anything really, but I managed to get it anyway. And much of it--most of it, really--came from people I haven't laid eyes on since Pat Benatar was still tearing up the pop charts. But we've managed to reconnect in some small way, and those folks took the time to send a few positive words, and it really meant a lot to me. 

So while a lot of weird, bad stuff happened to me this past year, such as almost getting Dooced this summer, and being in financial straits the whole rest of the year as a result, and losing a family member, I've decided to instead focus on the positive things: I've got a wife who seems to have some measure of affection and respect for me (only god knows why and he ain't telling); I've re-connected with some other family members with whom I haven't had much of a relationship for the past several years, and I'm not only re-building relationships with folks from high school, I'm establishing new ones that weren't there the first time around. And I hope to continue building on all of this in the year to come. 

Here's to 2009, and to an even better 2010. 

Comments

[sailorgrl21]

Hear, Hear!!