It’s the third day of the new year. Too early to get stuck and give up. It’s too early to sink into negativity though there are so many reasons to. A New Year’s Eve celebration at a Swiss ski resort turned into a firey disaster with 40 dead and over 100 injured. Untimely deaths due to overstretched healthcare. Then this morning’s news of Venezuela’s president being captured by the U.S. Is this legal? Obviously it is possible since it’s already happened. The world is too much for me.

Closer to home, my father’s younger brother died suddenly before Christmas. I seem to be losing relatives at an alarming speed. We only learned of his passing because his youngest brother, my other uncle decided to phone him. His wife answered and just said he passed with no further information. It is distressing to get such a phone call when I was just sitting down to coffee with my father at the mall. I had to play detective to find out if this was indeed true. We have not heard much from my father’s brother or his family. My mother was the one who tried to keep in touch with them. But she’s been gone for a year. To make a long story short, it is true.

It is sad that though we are family, we are strangers. They live just 2 hours down that lonesome highway. They have a daughter living here in the city. If I had ever ran into her, I wouldn’t know. I did get 2 of their children’s phone numbers from my aunt. I texted 2 of them. The daughter here did not respond. The eldest son responded right away. He seemed like a very nice person. I feel I have at least gained one family member. I told the son that we will not be going to the funeral. My father is 94 and my mother had passed last October. We’ve had a difficult year. It is winter. the roads and weather are unpredictable.

It has been indeed a hard year. We’ve all weathered it well. But we are tired. This winter is a bit strange. I’m relieved the holiday season is over. It did not at all felt like Christmas or New Year. I’ve made no resolutions or set goals. In the last Ultimate Blog Challenge I wrote about a goal of losing weight. Guess what? I haven’t and I’ve gained a few pounds instead. And I’ve already not showed up for the 2nd day of this challenge. I’m not looking at it as failure. I’m not looking at it as anything. If I was to have a goal, it would be not to marinate myself in negativity. You know what they say about the law of attraction and algorithms.