Births, Marriages and Deaths and all that.......

Well this has been an interesting week or so, at a time of the year when it seems to me that there is more bad news than good (or is that my imagination?)  and this year is no exception.  I am a moderator on a UK book swapping site, and recently one of our longest standing members died after a long, long fight against cancer.  Never complaining, only noting what happened next, and offering so much advice to other members with problems, whether healthwise or not.  I met her twice, and "talked" to her on the site.  I liked her;  and now she is gone.

Then this morning, to my sad surprise, a lovely blog called "Letters from a Hill Farm" (http://lettersfromahillfarm.blogspot.co.uk/) from a woman in New England who loves food, and books and music has closed.  She is sad herself but feels it is the right time.  She is leaving the blog up, but she has closed her "comments", so that (presumably) she will not have to cry over all the replies she was bound to get saying "Oh No!"........

But then two lovely things have happened.  First, our two Canadian friends were in the UK for the first time in several years.  We saw them last in Canada 5 years ago, so the gaps are long.  They have family here, so we managed to grab them for a couple of days at Pine Tree Cottage, and spent lots of hours talking and laughing, which was a great tonic.  Sort of agreed that we would take another trip to them in 2013.  They live in Nova Scotia - a lovely part of the world which always makes me wonder why people always think they must go to Vancouver and the Rockies if they are going to "do" Canada!  Go on, have a look at Nova Scotia!

Then last, but definitely not least, two other friends got married secretly - we got an email a week later saying "me and him, 2 witnesses, 12 noon on 12.12.12!"  accompanied by a lovely picture showing them both grinning their heads off!  As they have been together at least 20 years this will not change anything except tax and next of kin stuff some may just ask why?   But it was such lovely news.

So you see, it has been a sort of when one door closes another opens kind of time.  And when you think about it, life is really like that all the time, isn't it?

Wishing you a peaceful Christmas Season, and a very good 2013.