I once had a desk calendar, the type where you turn each day’s page over a pair of arched metal bindings and lay it face down on top of all the other used days. Gone. Dismissed.
That style of paper calendar has since been replaced with several tech versions. Last week, I found myself longing for the old style. I wanted to tear out the last page instead of turning it over. Rip out December 31. Crumple it up. Run it through the shredder.
In 2022, retirement plans crumbled as inflation roared, supply chains snapped and needless war rambled. People and animals were lost or displaced by fire and water storms: our products of climate change. In my new home town, people contested solutions to homelessness. Drivers wedged in aggressively to win a car-length’s advantage. It felt as though the place I’d moved to had inched closer to the place I’d left.
2022 saw the last link to my parents’ estate settled. Taking my share of their legacy was a reminder that they’re no longer here. It’s been six years since I last ran out to their snowbird haven and sighed as Lilly, our Boston terrier, played tug-of-war with mom or snuggled in Papa Paul’s lap. In October, Lilly had 10 teeth pulled, some because of crowding, others due to her parent’s negligence in performing her regular oral hygiene.
Last Tuesday, I was primed to rip out the last page of 2022 when a team of climbers flashed across my TV screen. They were closing in on Nala, a frightened dog separated from her distraught Utah family during a Christmas Eve hike. She was spotted Christmas day, perched on a ridge above a frozen waterfall. Nala dodged rescuers’ first tries to corral her; a drone eventually steered her toward waiting hands filled with hugs and treats.
When the story finished, I gazed through a window at the featureless night sky and understood that my perception of life’s events had become just as flat. I’d become fixed on the darkness at the expense of light, temporarily blinded to how dependent one is upon the other.
Within pure light or darkness, nothing stands out in relief. We can neither perceive the shadows cast by our experience nor harvest the light of knowledge from them. I miss my parents because of who they were and how we loved each other. Reminders that they are no longer here ring the bells of their cherished importance to me. My pain and regret over Lilly’s lost teeth has been channeled into a happy, bedtime toothbrushing game to preserve the 32 teeth she has left. Pet euthanasia rates are down from a decade ago, but remain intolerable in any number. Meanwhile, my social media messaging lights up with the work of non-profits scrambling at all hours to pull animals back from death’s door.
I cannot remember a single year of my life during which darkness and light hadn’t co-mingled, a bittersweet melange of contrasts without which I’d have felt — and learned — nothing.
Last night, I turned 2022’s last page over gently.