Countdown

Friends,

The one event we share in common with most of the rest of the world is the ritual of acknowledging the turn of the calendar into a new year. We all seem to need to mark passages that define our life spans and define the cycles of our lives, those of our family and friends, and the world in general. New Year’s celebrations are often the opportunity for us to look back on the past year and to send our bodies and souls into a new set of resolutions, dreams, plans, and commitments to face the challenges about what to expect in the year ahead of us.

Although it is no longer part of my new year eve’s ritual, I remember staying up until midnight with the television fixed on Times Square in NYC waiting for a countdown for a giant ball to drop at midnight followed by great cheering and hoopla. Locally firework displays seem to best mark the moment here in the northwest, but in rural Ohio where I grew up people would shoot their rifles in the air. In any case, noise seems to be one way to punctuate the calendar transitions, and I guess that makes sense for some.

But my preferred way is to take time for a quiet, humble remembrance of the past year followed by shared hopes for the coming year. For a number of years we were joined by another couple for a special, several course meal on New Year’s Eve during which each of us in turn was given an opportunity to share and rehearse our past year's experience. Then we regathered the following morning for each of us to share our plans and expectations for our lives in the coming year. What a lovely way to mark a transition in our lives.

This year as I gather with friends I will be experiencing more than usual anxiety about the countdown to this coming year. It seems particularly difficult to make plans for the coming year given the uncertainty about the course of our lives under the Trump administration. The proposed changes in government leadership suggest, at a minimum, a great deal of turmoil nationally, and in ways we simply cannot yet imagine, various ways the chaos will impact us all, especially the most financially and politically vulnerable. 

We will each need to find a way to live constructively and courageously through these coming years. As we launch into 2025 we will need our reminiscences of years past to sort through what we most need and value that will continue to nurture and guide us during this difficult time, what we are in danger of loosing, and perhaps what positive changes might evolve in terns of lifestyle and relationships as we adapt to the wider challenges around us. I have been thinking, for example, about the traumatic impact the Covid epidemic had on our lives, how we had to radically change our every day lives in order to be safe and to meet our personal and social needs. And now we can look back on all the fears and uncertainties we survived during the epidemic from the perspective of both how much was lost, but also how the epidemic led to important transformations in our understanding of our social interdependencies and lifestyles among other insights. We learned to profoundly value, for example, the heroic, often sacrificial support and care we received during our new found crucial dependencies from those who fed us, dealt with our illnesses, transported us, and risked their lives to provide for our basic needs  Perhaps the turmoil of the Trump administration will also create new bonds of support, new generative practices and behaviors, as we must overcome the realities of a radically different value and leadership base confronting our lives.

So the countdown is on for 2025 and a Trump inauguration. In spite of trepidations and fears, may the year also begin with our heartfelt expressions of gratitude for the year(s) past, and may we be filled with strong commitments to continue to live faithful and kind lives in the coming year, especially in spite of how life may be very confusing and difficult for us. We can and will meet the challenge with personal courage and resilience surrounded by our reliance of the many strands of interdependence and faith-filled compassion that will hold and guide us.

Blessings of peace in the new year,
Tom