December baby. A week before Christmas. My mother told me many years ago she and my father put me under the tree. I was their Christmas present.

In rural Pennsylvania in December – at least in years past it was a snowflake spectacle. Temperatures in The 30’s and 40’s were the norm, roadways were toboggan runs for how treacherous they potentially were.

I claim the period from my birthday through New Year’s day as my personal holiday. It is a period of time that I have through a significance of events from my very early babyhood come to bond with and identify with the butterflies in your stomach feeling.

Reality shift. My father decided to go out one New Year’s day. A New Year’s Day that was just two weeks beyond my first birthday. He did not return. The toboggan run got him and this was no ordinary accident. This was a series of events that very likely could have been avoided.

since he didn’t come back to explain himself the only recourse anyone has ever had has been to deduce what happened that day. Details will not be given here.

I have learned to turn this loss into positives over the years. I can hear trauma in a lot of detail. I’m comfortable with chaos.
I’m comfortable with reality turning on a dime.

I Believe and truly experience the concept of control to be an illusion.

This time of year – the time between December 19th and New Years Day is mine.