Looking Back From the Future

I appreciated this post.

As challenging as things are in the Linden household right now, we also have friends and family that are going through their own trials and tribulations. And I don't mean your typical "hard day" I mean knee-quaking, white-knuckling hard times.

What a year.

"Every thing's great in 2008!"

Lately, I have been joking with friends, "We will settle for "fine" in 2009!"

A scene from the tail end of the Lord of the Rings trilogy keeps replaying in my mind;

After a year of travels and trials and adventures, wars, destruction and death, fighting the force of darkness on the slopes of mount doom which threatens to mutilate and destroy all life as it is known . . . etc., four hobbits sit at a table in their favorite pub - each with an untouched mug of beer in front of them.

It's over. They survived. They are back.

The pub is loud and boisterous and full of raucous laughter and merry-making but the four sit in silence. They aren't happy - they aren't sad - they are just. back. A little older, a little wiser and a little taller if you read the books. They sit there knowing that the next time evil strikes, they can face it down because evil has thrown everything it had at them and it's over. They survived. They are back.

All at once, they slowly reach for their beers and look each other in the eye as they first raise and then bang their mugs together in a silent toast - knowing smiles spreading across their faces.

May we all be so lucky come January 1st . . . .