It’s the day of the deep breath before I launch into Christmas weekend. I did a little shopping yesterday. Wrapped a present or two. I’ll do two today. No running around, though. No drives. I’ll read, watch a little TV, work on the computer, which is not something most young people do anymore. They work on tablets or their phones. But I like the big screen, the tactile feel of the keyboard, the mouse. Of course, my computer is a laptop, but I have it setup as a desktop. Old school, I guess. I can still take it on the road.

In facet, we hit the road tomorrow. Family Christmas day. Wilson style. Which means we might have musical instruments. Or not. No set agenda. We’ll miss one grandchild. He’s in St. Louis, but everyone else will be there. The best part for me is hovering in the background listening to the chatter of my children and their children and the dogs, all being lively and alive. Of course, we’ll all think of the missing mother but it’s a party and one she would have loved, so we’ll carry on, in loving memory.

And that’s an old, trite saying, carrying on because in the grand scheme of things it’s something we do all the time, carry on. It’s the essence of life. We get a job, lose a job, get hired, get fired, get lost, get found, get sick, get well, we carry on. Even when the grieving is hard, most people carry on, some simply move a little slower than others. It’s normal, because time, in it’s relentless fashion carries on and drags us along with it, until one day we wake up and say, okay, I think I’ll walk. And we do.