THE HOPES & FEARS OF A NEW YEAR!!

By William for CrossDove Writers

I truly hope that all had a HAPPY, HAPPY NEW YEAR’S EVE and kicked in the new year of 2020 without any incidents.

I looked at the calendar the other day and realized that we were getting ready to not only finalize our steps of 2019, but we were finalizing our steps for the second decade of the 2000’s already. How the heck did that happen.

I for one can look back at the past decade and find gratefulness as to the fact that I was able to be here and step from 2019 into the new year of 2020, complete with a lengthy kiss from the wife and a wet sloppy one from my puppy buddy, Frosty Lou.

Grateful because I nearly did not make it out of the second year of this decade due to a massive, ‘widow maker’ heart attack that took my life for a few minutes on November 27, 2012. Grateful because I had the heart attack while on a gurney in the emergency room of our local hospital and within seconds had numerous medical folks working on and successfully bringing me back for another round of living.

Grateful for the fact that I am still walking and talking after having five stents put in my ticker and then taking responsibility for a diagnosis of late Stage III COPD to go along with my life long severe Asthma in February of 2013.

But I am here and as I remind my grandkids, I hope to be around for them when they all graduate from high school and/or college and hopefully when they all get married.

My HOPES AND FEARS for the upcoming year of 2020 are ones I think and know I can work with and succeed at or overcome if I just keep my mind looking straight ahead and working for the goal of a successful year.

My number one HOPE is to do a much better job of taking my abilities of writing to a more consistent level when it comes to my blogs like this ‘Grumpy Gramps’ where I share my observations of life, of ‘Lenny & Me 4 Today’ in which I share about my journey and battles with more than one chronic illness, and when I am ‘Just Sayin’ or sharing ‘My Box of Crayons’ to try and share my thoughts and ideas of the world as it is today.

HOPE number two is also pertaining to my writing as I want to stay diligent on a few major writing projects that include a short novel about a community of un-perfect folks living a near perfect life, a book covering a set of steps to deal with a chronic illness, a collection of my favorite essays, a book on being a preacher’s kid and those few other short story/novelette ideas I have been considering. In other words, my hope lies in spending some quality time every day putting my thoughts, ideas and imagination into words.

My number three HOPE for 2020 is to make more of an effort to be an ambassador of information and research for those with a chronic illness, especially when it comes to the ones I battle like COPD and severe Asthma.

HOPE number four is to work on being much more diligent on my body and getting it back into a more workable shape and comfort level. This means pushing myself to daily get some walking in or at least time on the exercise bike while becoming obnoxious about what, how much and when I eat!

The fifth HOPE I have for 2020 is to continue working on becoming a better person for my wife, my family (which now includes my father still alive and well at age 89, two sisters, a brother and two in-laws, plus my own five adult children and the two in-laws they put on our family tree, ten grandchildren and two great-grandchildren with one more on the way). Oh, I should also add my friends and of course my constant companion – Frosty Lou, our Maltese puppy.

As for the FEARS I need to face up to in 2020:

FEAR number one in the new year will become reality if I get three or four months into the new year and realize how many of those hopes I have already busted or faltered on.

FEAR number two in the new year has to do with my health as I continue to struggle with keeping in check my COPD and severe asthma while remembering that due to my massive heart attack I also have a part of the ticker that only works at 45% capacity. I will help if I can overcome the fear of exercise and get my weight down because I know how much better I feel when I do get it moving downward.

FEAR number three in the new year includes keeping friendships, something for which I seem to struggle with while not always understanding why.

FEAR number four in the new year is what happens if I don’t overcome my anxiety/panic attacks about being around a bunch of people and I continue to become much like a hermit or loner, something which I have realized is my reality the last half of 2019. When younger, I never was one to shy away from people and places like I seem to do now and that my friends is something that needs to be dealt with.

FEAR number five for the new year is finances as I live on disability and over that past 16 months have lost both my part-time incomes to supplement them due the financial inabilities of not one, but two local newspapers. It becomes very stressful when one does not have any money to do anything extra beyond paying the bills. Guess this is where I need to write more and be more out going on getting them published.

For today, that is generally how I am looking at the walk I have taken out of the year 2019 and into the year 2020 – a new decade of challenges.

This is all about where my heart is at this moment of time.

This is all about my HOPES & FEARS for the NEW YEAR!!

With that – hugs, prayers, blessings and happy thoughts from Grumpy Gramps.

(Copyright@2020, CrossDove Writers – no part of this posting may be printed, copied or used without written permission by CrossDove Writers and Grumpy Gramps.)