Hello, Goodbye, Happy New Year

marjorie says...

This New Year has started off for me with saying goodbye. There are several universal themes that run through the course of one’s life. Saying goodbye is one of them. Last night I said goodbye to my uncle at Baylor hospital in Dallas. I’m not particularly good in these moments, and wish I was more capable of the emotional response that those most closely impacted need. But beyond that, for myself alone, I have been full of reflection these past couple of days about the fact that goodbye is indeed goodbye.

I loved my uncle very much, although we didn’t have a particularly close relationship. He was simply a person who I felt completely comfortable around, had much admiration for, and who took care of me as a child in a way that made him stand out. And he was the father and spouse of truly loved cousins and my dear aunt. First and foremost for me is the hope and wish that my aunt makes this transition in a way that fills the coming years with a positive wonder at new feelings and experiences after a lifetime spent firmly joined to one person. That’s what I hope for her, and for myself when I reach the age that death begins to manifest itself more and more in my life.

I’ll save my further philosophical musings on life and death for another post that I’ve promised Maggie I will write about why I like vampire novels. Instead, let me simply stay with the notion of “goodbye.” One thing death most certainly does is clearly illuminate the one instance when goodbye has an absolute finality to it. When I consider my New Year’s resolutions, beyond the practical and mundane, I think I’ll make the primary one centered on not being so fast about goodbye. When our minds and hearts are open to people, simple shifts can often not only save a relationship but make it more expansive than it ever was before. Perhaps what was borderline goodbye can on occasion be transformed into a new hello.

Happy New Year to you all, m-pyre readers. May your 2008 be blessed and full of joy.