As the Calendar Turns…

The old year ends and the new one begins. It seems like such a trite concept yet somehow I find myself falling into the familiar pattern so many of us embrace with the changing of the kitchen calendar.

As I reflect on all the things I planned to accomplish last year, I find on some accounts I fell woefully short. I didn’t lose weight like I had hoped. In fact, I packed on a bit more. Not through holiday eating – I actually started losing weight around Thanksgiving. No, medical issues dictated I take medication that caused weight gain.

I also haven’t been as conscientious about my professional self-studies as I would have liked to have been. Every time I began to make progress, the tyranny of the urgent called my name.

I lost a friend to cancer this year. His friendship made a profound impact in my life. I will miss his wit and wisdom that he sowed in the years I knew him. I can’t pass a Backyard Burger restaurant without thinking of Russ. But he is home with our Lord now. I hope he’s made friends with my father. I think they would make each other laugh.

There were many triumphs as I made my way through this past year, giving me reasons to rejoice. In a down market amid the subprime scandals of 2007, my mother’s house closed. I am relieved and grateful at God’s timing in the sale of her home. My mother continues to flourish in her new home that is close to ours.

My own health continues to improve and I am now able to walk without pain.

Early in the year we took a week’s cruise in the Caribbean with family and friends from Southeast Christian Church in Louisville. My husband and I also celebrated two years of marital bliss and my birthday with a short weekend cruise back to the Caribbean. We also celebrated at our 20-year college reunion with a trip to Taylor University in Upland, Indiana. It was a wonderful time of connecting and reconnecting with friends and their spouses.

We were blessed to host friends and relatives during the summer as well as over Thanksgiving and Christmas. I even developed a couple more domestic goddess talents with new recipes and old favorites.

We have a warm home in these cold Chicago days and even colder nights. We love and we are loved by others.

But most importantly, we know we are loved by God and are following the path He sets before us. He has promised to provide for our needs. He has provided in the past. We have no reason to doubt He will continue to do so while we stay in His plans for us.

While on some fronts I find myself wishing for a few of the days of last year back for a “do-over,” I head into this new year hopeful for the possibilities of what lies ahead. I still have the goals of losing weight and advancing my professional self-studies.

My hope for myself is the same hope I have for each of you reading this. May there be positive and exciting changes in the year ahead and may you find a way to see God’s guidance through the challenges that He allows to come into your life.

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