2017: The Begining of The End

Today is New Years Eve....On any other year I would be looking back on all of my traveling adventures, memories, and new beginnings in life. There would be joyous feelings of nostalgia intertwined with bittersweet memories. But today I sit here in my living room, alone. The only sound I can hear is the occasional crackling from the fire in my wood stove. I'm scrolling Facebook reading  about how everyone had the absolute best god damn year of their life. There are stories of birth, of engagements,  of weddings, of family fun, and everything in between. I am happy for them. I truly am, but I cannot relate right now. I feel strangled and trapped by my grief for my brother. Because this is the beginning of the end..... 2017 will be the last year I heard Alex's voice, it will be the last year I held his clammy hand, the last year I felt his heartfelt hugs, and ultimately the last year he was living on this earth. I miss him. Sometimes I feel like its been a lifetime since I've seen him. And yet I cannot believe its already been over eight months since he died. How can that be? How can I still feel such as immense amount of pain? Suicide is so incredibly hard to understand. I think it takes on a new level of grief for those that are left behind. As humans we have become custom to cause and effect situations. What caused my brother lose his life to suicide? I don't know, and I never will. We are left with a spinning wheel of what-ifs and whys. Don't get me wrong the year has not been all bad. I am watching my son grow up to be an amazing little boy and I am taking on some new and exciting endeavors. I decided that tomorrow I will wake up and make the conscious choice to be happy. Alex would want me to be happy. That doesn't mean that I can't still be sad sometimes but it means that I will wake up everyday and choose joy. I will choose hope. Because without hope there will be no future.