Thursday, December 31, 2015

May Your Shirts All Be Pocketed!


IMAGE : THE MOTHER LOAD | Shirts Be Pocketed
As we skid across the line from one year to the next tonight, the usual amount of yearly reflection saw some family members and I sitting around the kitchen bench last night, chatting about the woes of recent years gone by. (I know, right? We're a barrel of laughs).

As generally lucky and blessed as we are, we've seen our fair share of shit on the shovel in the last two years. There have definitely been some dodgy times through 2014 and 2015 and as it turns out, our family has a tendency to toss those various woes around in conversation like deflated footballs, comparing one to the other.  Our discussion is not a competition about who had it the worst but rather more a bit of a therapy session knowing that at a certain point it's good to download and discuss these challenges particularly when you're on the tail end of them. It seems to make everyone feel as though they've conquered and survived their own little Everest or something. So we say, "Remember this one? But don't forget this! Or that - what about that! That was terrible!" Etc. etc. and then everyone feels a little better about the past and about looking forward into the new year.

From our discussions we've decided that although 2015 had its moments of resembling steaming piles of cow dung, it was comparably better than 2014 which was quite a humourless joke of misfortune and hideousness in hindsight. That being said, we all agree that things are definitely looking up for the coming year and 2016 is going to be a winner for all. So that's quite good!

And as an aside (and quite amusingly), in amongst all the discussion about family challenges and of epic tempests gone by, another family member had declared to my mother yesterday that this Christmas period had been of great disappointment to him, largely because a shirt he was given as a gift didn't have a pocket and was therefore unwearable. Now you kinda need to know this relative to understand where this degree of 'misfortune' comes from but nonetheless, it did make me choke on my leftover Christmas pudding and laugh. This was indeed a life lesson I was not yet aware of - apparently, a man needs a pocket in order to call a shirt worthy of wearing. Who knew? By declaring this somewhat of a 'catastrophe', I believe this relative of ours had victoriously conjured up the mother of all first world problems - the dictionary definition so to speak. And while my first reaction was to laugh and utter the old 'WTF?",  I also felt quite happy for him that he had clearly dodged all of the family's real ups and downs of the last two years without even realising. Lucky bugger.

So with that in mind (and knowing now that perspective and resilience are perhaps not always genetically inherited characteristics!), here's to a rich and ripe 2016 full of love, laughter, health and good fortune for every one of us.

And most importantly, in 2016 and beyond may all of your shirts be pocketed. God willing.



2 comments :

  1. Let me guess? Just let me guess!
    Bests from me to you. ML FGM

    ReplyDelete