There’s a nice chill in the air and Christmas still seems a long way off, at least to me. It’s a nice sign that time has slowed a bit. Or at least my experience of it. There’s no rush to do anything. No pressure to get something done. Of course, there are still things to do, but they can be done at leisure. I can take my time, which I suppose means I have time in the bank, and I can spend it as I will.

Mostly what I do these days is think about next year. This year was a good year for me. The burden of grief eased under a steady stream of good days. I’d like the trend to continue. The trap, of course, is thinking I can replicate this year, which is well nigh impossible. Too many variables, too many unknowns, too much of everything. If life is a song, the key, tempo, melody, and harmonies are always on the move and band members come and go.

Maybe this is the year I spend more time in Houston or on the road to faraway places. I have several trips already in the works, repetitions of last year’s journey’s, but I also have friends in Tennessee and North Carolina who want to see me. Heck, I could easily spend a week in Galveston, just sitting on the beach watching the tide roll in and out. I simply need to keep my heart open to the possibility of new things just as I did this year, and let the blessings come when they come, to roll in and sit beside the old memories, reminding me as they’ve done in the past that tomorrow is always a new day, and you never know what joys it might bring and from whence they might come.

John W. Wilson is the author of The Long Goodbye: A Caregiver's Tale