A New Year

There will be new beginnings in 2013. Of that, I'm sure. What they will be, and of anything else, well, I have no clue.

2012 rocked me at the core, and handed me something so unexpected and unfathomable that I am forever changed.

I started writing this as the year came to and end and the new year began, and I seriously was stumped at what to write.  It's hard to write about new beginnings and fresh starts when you are still grasping to understand what was.

I don't sit in the same place I did other years, setting goals, making plans, feeling empowered by a fresh start and a new year.

For many, it is a clean slate, a chance to start over fresh, begin anew.  It's easy to forget some problems and leave 2012 in the dust.  We can't forget 2012.  In some ways, we will be stuck there forever.  For me, for my family, it will forever be the year Kelci's life here ended.

Some parts of our life, just stopped there.  Kelci will always be 22 there.  Kelci will always be alive there.  2012 is etched in our memory, forever, an anniversary we'd gladly forget.

Of course, I will move forward, but always with THIS (Kelci's passing).  Yes, I'll go on to my "new normal".  My new normal.  A very hard concept to grasp.  I've heard this many times in the past 5 months, I think I might have said it a time or two myself, and in the past two days I've heard it twice, from two other moms who will never forget 2012 for the same reason I won't.  Their daughter's lives ended too.  None of this is normal.

We didn't choose this, yet here we are struggling to find a way to live life without Kelci.  I don't want to be a mom without her daughter, but here I am.  It is what it is.  My new mantra.

Yes, life is dramatically different now.  Things that were important six months ago just aren't now, and others are exceedingly more important. 

Most things can, and should be left in the past, but for me 2012 will be one I'll never forget nor completely let go of.  For me 2012 was very much an end. There are some things you just never get over.  This is one of them.  You gone on, you move forward, but always, always you carry it with you.

Yes, I will find a way to have a happy new year.  For me, for us, my family, this is non-negotiable.  From the beginning, we have chose love, and that will get us through.

Happy New Year!  Do what ever you have to do to make it the best year yet.