It's the end of the year. Do you have any thoughts about it?
Sometimes at the end of a year I reflect upon it. Other times not so much. There's no real reason why other than it's the arbitrary end of one year and beginning of the next year. How random? Well, it didn't become the rage until the middle ages. Most of Europe had March 25th as the first day of the new year. Where Coptic Christians were, September 1st was the first day of the new year. Finally January 1st eventually became the agreed upon date of the new year. Here's a smattering of when that happened in several European countries:
1522 Republic of Venice
1544 Holy Roman Empire (Germany)
1556 Spain, Portugal
1559 Prussia, Sweden
1564 France
1576 Southern Netherlands
1579 Lorraine
1583 United Provinces of the Netherlands (northern)
1600 Scotland
1700 Russia
1721 Tuscany
1752 Great Britain (excluding Scotland) and its colonies
When I reflect upon the end of a year, I think about what happened. I think about people that have passed away and things that ended...and about new beginnings. This, I believe to be good if for no other reason than to let go of baggage I don't want to bring with with me into the new year so I can then put my energy into what I want to happen in the future vs. dwelling on the past.
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I don't make New Year's resolutions because why do that? I mean you can make a resolution any darn day of the year. Resolutions are really just an acknowledgment of what you think you need to do but have put off for far too long. There's only one resolution anyway and that's to complete what you start, whatever it is. It's actually fake will power. Just do it or don't, but for cripes sake quit pretending that having a New Year's resolution gives something more mojo. Actually, from what I've seen, most resolutions never really come to fruition. It seems they are more a realization that you don't have the will power to do something you feel you really need to do.
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For some reason I thought about my sister today. I dunno why. We don't talk and haven't for decades really. As far as I'm concerned she basically screwed up for too long. She's been a junkie since she was 16 years old. I've heard she stopped doing drugs recently. I don't know if I can really believe that, after all it's been 36 years.
Did I think about her because I want to start a relationship with her again. Nope. She'd just use me as she's used everyone. I dunno why I thought about her.
The list of people's she's lied to so as to manipulate mostly for money is huge. The number of cars she's crashed while high is something. Too many times she's ended up in the hospital after nearly killing herself or due to some horrible infection somewhere on her body. But she's still around. Now she's at the point where she's trying to get on permanent disability to get a monthly stipend from the government to live on.
Here's a song and video though I've always associate with my sister:
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Next, I am going to post a picture of a beautiful bird. I found it three days ago on my front lawn. Actually Sancho my little rat terrier found it. It was just lying there. It didn't seem hurt. Sancho grabbed it and the bird made a noise in protest. I took the bird and could see no injuries or sign of illness. I believe it was just old and dying. I showed smileycreek. Within minutes it passed away. It is so beautiful. I don't know what it is. It looks like some kind of crested flycatcher. Look at the beautiful head and colors. Look at the bright yellow ends to the tail feathers and little orange ends to some of the wing feathers. So gorgeous. I feel privileged to have been able to be with it when it died.
Finally I'm posting a picture I took of the fire in my wood burning stove this morning. To me it looks like a dragon's head on fire. This picture then is for Dragon. There's even a plume of fire coming straight out of the middle of the dragon's head.
Any year-end random thoughts in your head? Wanna talk about it?
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