What Is It About January?
Battle of Pavia Tapestries Exhibit - From Naples to Fort Worth

4 Years Later

Once again, January works its magic, and here we are. Writing something on this blog.

The transportive effect of reading what I wrote in the last post, 2 weeks into 2020, is hard to shake. The first paragraphs, along with the ending sentence (“Let’s start this thing!”) could be rewritten verbatim right now and fit perfectly (minus the part about having written thousands of words of a novel last year, which I did not do this time around). But the other words of that final paragraph can be haunting, if permitted:

”So, 2020. Where have you been all my life?”

No such tempting of fate will be attempted here.

Five days in, I am already grateful beyond belief. It is enough that the year began with one of my teams winning, one losing. SO CLOSE to having a ridiculously improbable dream realized, the one where both of my teams play each other for the national championship. But despite a dream year for the Longhorns falling about thirteen yards short at the end of the semifinal, my alma mater’s football team will not be battling my original college football love, Michigan, in Houston for the title. It is now solely up to the Wolverines to finish the job.

And it is enough that my family was able simply to be together for the holidays, and that my wife’s mother is still with us despite all prior indications to the contrary (never underestimate the will to fight, no matter what the doctors and nurses tell you). We never know how long we have with our loved ones, young or old, and this holiday season has been a daily proof of that reality. From the day we took her to the hospital for some general unwellness two days before Thanksgiving, to the weeks-long struggle for her very life, to the somewhat stable condition she is now in.

The truth is, no person knows how long any of us has. The only one who truly knows is God, and for us and our faith in that all-knowing, all-encompassing plan and the One who created it, that is enough.

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