Long December

Pic is of a roadside memorial to two young men that died in a motorcycle wreck this past week.
So I'm going to work one morning a couple of days before Christmas, and as I pop over a hill I see Blue lights...... Lots of em. I see a bright light like they use to do road construction at night. Highway patrol has the center three lanes blocked but I didn't see a wreck.
Found out later that it was the subject of the above photo.
Tried to find out what happened on the news but got a bunch of he said she said. I was about to chalk it up to natural selection, and still might, but I needed time to process it all.
December is a time of promise, and silver and gold for the young. For some of us though it is the bitter witches heart of the year. For me, it was ten years ago the twentieth that my mother died. My wife drove 16 hours in a snowstorm to get me there in time to say a proper goodbye. I remember. About the time I get the tree loaded with gifts, I remember.
This year, about a week or two before Christmas my Dads girlfriend suddenly died.
I guess they had been together about five years now.
I got a call from a woman that lives in our neighborhood. (I don't know her well) She told me that a dear friend that had moved away was in the hospital, diagnosed with bone cancer. She works where he banks. It was tough to go and see him and to talk to him since he got home and started his treatments. He is one of only two in this neighborhood that I could talk to about anything. I think the thing I love about him most is that he is a thinking man. (Count blessings, I have more then one friend here) So the season has been busy, and the economy is in the tank, but it could be so very much worse. Just ask the mothers of the two young men that died this past week here.