2025: A View from the Gutter

I am coming up, in about 4 months, to my 62nd rotation around the sun.  That's a lot of years, and I am both thankful and blessed to be here typing at this very moment (make that "moments", as this will no doubt get written in pieces).  There have been good years...such as any year when any of my daughters were born...and there have been bad years.  I think that, when all is said and done, the dust is settled, and the ink is dry, 2025 will turn out to be far more on the negative side of life's ledger (and not just for me).

While I don't talk about it much, losing my brother Joe was tough.  It's kind of like losing a part of your own body...a part where the loss doesn't physically harm you...but you still feel a tiny bit less complete.  It's also a realization that there is one fewer person on the planet who sort of understood things about our growing up, one less witness.  I've already told my brother Rich he's not allowed to die.

On the national front, I think we, as a nation, are suffering from a kind of chaos fatigue.  It's as if the current president is in a continual race to the bottom, except for the fact that there is no bottom to be reached.  We collectively just sit and watch while another cruel act is ordained, another late-night social media tirade is launched, and another group is maligned for no real reason other than being different.  The specific group doesn't matter by the way, as yesterday's Somali will be tomorrow's other marginalized group.  The fact that we have 3 more years of this is enough to make someone want to just crawl into a cave and wait it out.  In the end, and regardless of politics, no country or leader was "great" because of who they hated.  Let that one sink in for a bit.

Another loss in 2025 was that of my father-in-law, the Rev. David Rivers.  There are times when you meet people who are just so diametrically different than what you've experienced before in your life that you end up being changed in ways that can be equal parts subtle and yet profound.  That was David.  The world is now smaller, a bit less fun, and certainly not nearly as wise with him gone.  The only real consolation is the fact that some of his best traits are manifest in his children, especially his oldest daughter Christine.

As a relatively crappy year, I naturally decided to deal with a long-standing health issue, resulting in a late November surgery.  I am glad that it's over, but as I creep into my early 60's, I'm reminded that every machine wears over time...both the mechanical and physiological ones.  I need to take better care of my own machinery.  That's far easier said than done. 

On the professional front, I am at a sunset, if you will, of my working career.  That's equal parts relieving and terrifying.  I continue to push myself a bit too far, a point that others have made on more than one occasion.  I was raised, if you will, in a working world where there was a kind of constant competition.  That kind of ethos doesn't actually depend on specific circumstances...it just exists in whatever reality I work in...whether it makes sense or not.  Some things just don't come with an off switch.  Yet the lack of such an off switch meant that, in 2025, I did far, far less of the things outside of work that I enjoy, basically just hopping between stressful work assignments.  As I stare down the time off days I am losing, it's pretty clear that I have been far crueler to myself than I would ever tolerate in someone else.  None of the above is to claim that I don't find myself in a working environment that may be more demanding than it should be, but in the end, the only real resource and decision-making powers I actually have are over myself.

So goodbye 2025.  Don't let the door hit you in the tuchus on the way out.

As for 2026, the beauty of a new year is just that...it is new.  While I know I'll probably make mistakes (I/we always do) there is also promise and potential.  Here's to going into the new year a bit smarter for the wear, and a bit more kind...to ourselves and to each other.  I think our nation needs it, desperately.

(Fun facts:  This song paraphrases the quote reference in the title and the late Brigitte Bardot)