Happy 2025!

 

        Well,dear readers, we have reached a new year. 2025 is a year I neverdreamed in my youth that I would ever see. I also never dreamed Iwould be 80 years old! That seems so impossible at 18 or 20, whenyour whole life is in front of you. I could write a book about all mymistakes, all my successes, all my regrets and all the things Icelebrate, all my bad decisions and all the good ones I made, all mysorrows and all my joy, all the places I’ve been to, and all theplaces I would still like to go.

       Icould preach to young people about what you learn overthe years that is truly important in life, and what has no value at all;the importance of using money wisely and not trying to impress otherswith it; the true value and true meaning of love, and how to let loveget you through the rough times; and oh my, you see plenty of thoserough times over 80 years of living. I would tell them good health ismore important than anything else in life, and that everything theyput in their mouths or breathe in or do to their bodies can affectthat health, not always right away but years and years later.

       Mostyoung people think they will live forever. They think it doesn’tmatter if they eat or drink or smoke something wrong because theybelieve they will always recover and/or heal … that months or yearslater it will all go away. I would tell them that it doesn’t, andthat the worst thing in the world that can happen to them is to livewith regrets in old age and have to think about the “what if’s”… “What if I had never used drugs?” “What if I never drank orsmoked?” “What if I hadn’t thought it was so important to geta tan?” “What if I had paid attention to eating better?” “Whatif I had saved all the money I spent on frivolous things that have noimportance?”

       I’mnot saying I have done any of those things. I feel pretty good aboutmy own life, but I see so many mistakes young people make today. Yes,or course I have a few regrets and “what if’s,” but I guess ittakes getting older to become wiser, and the old adage is that wehave to let young people make their own mistakes. That’s how theylearn what is important. But when it is young people you love whomyou see making those mistakes, it’s so hurtful and worrisome.

       Isuppose thinking this way is common when we get older. I rememberwhen I was in my teens that older people thought rock ‘n roll wasgoing to destroy our youth and they would all end up slovenlycriminals. I remember when girls had to always wear dresses andnylons to school. Pants and jeans were considered sloppy andembarrassing clothing never to be worn in public. (Gosh, now Ipractically live in jeans!) Makeup was frowned upon, and shaking thewrong body parts when dancing would destroy a girl’s reputation. Iguess Elvis Presley changed all that, didn’t he?

         Isee and hear myself thinking and saying things my grandmother andmother used to say to me. What goes around, comes around. It’s justthat we learn so much over the years that we know what can truly hurtand what we can be happy about. And we love our children andgrandchildren so much that we do everything we can to protect, defendand teach them, hoping they won’t live to regret anything they havedone, hoping they won’t get hurt and won’t know sorrow or badhealth or poverty or heartbreak. But try as we might, that’simpossible. They are going to do what they are going to do, and wecan’t stop it. We can only sit and watch, and pray they make gooddecisions based on actually listening to grandma and grandpa’sadvice.

       Iam so grateful to still be healthy, and overall, I am happy with howlife has turned out for me. I am especially grateful to God for mygift of writing and for all the 75(+) books I have had published overthese many years. I have been published for 42 years and actuallywriting books for about 46 years, not counting the poems and articlesI wrote over many years before I tried books. I am grateful for allmy readers who have kept me going, grateful my brain and fingersstill work just fine so I can write a few more books, and I am sograteful that so many of my stories have been reissued and are stillselling after all these years. I am grateful that, through my books,my name will go on for quite a while after I leave this earth, andyes, crazy me still believes I will meet some of my characters in thehereafter because they are so real to me that I feel as though theirspirits are what inspire me to write their stories, as though theywhisper them to me.

       Andso comes a new year, and another God-given chance to change what wefeel needs to be changed, to spend time with our loved ones, to go forward, leaving regrets behind and using lessons learned to enjoywhatever years still lie ahead. I wish there was a way to meet everysingle one of my readers. I am so grateful for all of you, and so Isay with true sincerity …

       HAPPYNEW YEAR 2025 TO EACH AND EVERY ONE OF YOU!!!!!

        ANDHAPPY NEW YEAR 2025 TO YOUR SPOUSES, YOUR CHILDREN, GRANDCHILDREN,THE REST OF YOUR FAMILY AND ALL YOUR FRIENDS!!!!! TREASURE THEM ALL,AND TREASURE THE YEARS GOD HAS BLESSED YOU WITH.