Well, we made it to the end of 2023. It honestly doesn’t feel like the end, though. I mean really, this year went by so fast that part of me is still thinking it should be sometime in the summer! Doesn’t help that we’re in the middle of the brownest December we’ve had in years. I mentioned in an earlier post that we’ve had practically no snow up here in Canada thus far, and that’s still the case even now. You can go outside, take a look around, and be forgiven for thinking it’s August 31 and not December 31.

Bizarre weather aside, I know I’m not alone when I say that this was a rollercoaster of a year. The good times were good, the bad times were bad, and the mushy middle was, well, mushy I suppose. On one hand, I started losing weight and made some great new friends. I went to Vancouver for the first time, I dove deeper into my faith, and in general, I found that I was generally happier than I had been in previous years. I still am, for the record.

It wasn’t all great, though. I lost my grandma in June, she was 86. My health struggled all year, with more than a few bouts with the flu. Some other stressful things happened that are a little too personal for me to talk about here. Thankfully, I had the right people and the right mindset to guide me through all of that, and I feel that I’m ending this year stronger and wiser than when I started it.

I’ll end off with some words from the Word, specifically from the 37th Psalm:

“Fret not yourself because of evildoers; be not envious of wrongdoers! For they will soon fade like the grass and wither like the green herb. Trust in the Lord, and do good; dwell in the land and befriend faithfulness. Delight yourself in the Lord, and he will give you the desires of your heart.”

To all reading this or elsewhere, God bless and happy new year. Here’s hoping 2024 is a calmer, more sensible year than its immediate predecessors.