Nicola Vincent-Abnett

Nicola Vincent-Abnett
"Savant" for Solaris, Wild's End, Further Associates of Sherlock Holms, more Wild's End

Monday 31 December 2012

Out with the Old and In with the New!


So this is it! It’s time to say goodbye to 2012!

This is often the saddest day of the year for me, especially when it comes at the end of a particularly good or rewarding year, but 2012 has been... well... shall we say... mixed?

In fact, I can’t remember another year like it.

2012 saw me earn a place as runner-up in the Mslexia novel writing competition for ‘Naming Names’, as well as representation with my wonderful agent, which were great highs. However, I also suffered my worst bi-polar episode in a decade, which was a low that I really wasn’t expecting and could happily have managed without.

I wrote two novels in 2012, and I’m hugely proud of them both, so work has gone very well and been particularly rewarding this year. On the other hand, my nest is suddenly empty, and while it’s wonderful to have children out in the World, making lives for themselves, I also miss them every day that they are not at home.

Then there’s the husband. 

It’s hard to imagine that after knowing someone for thirty years, anything much can change in a relationship, but things do change; things change, people change, circumstances change. Our lives have changed a very great deal since the husband’s epilepsy diagnosis, three years ago; our lives have changed, our needs have changed, and our relationship has changed. We have had an extraordinary year together with the most amazing highs we’ve ever shared, and when we haven’t been sharing some of the best times of our lives, we’ve been taking a look at what didn’t work in the past and what we want for the future. 

There’s been a lot to talk about; some of the talking hasn’t been easy, and some of it’s led to real sadness.

That was 2012, and it will live large in my memory for a very long time.

It was the best of times, it was the worst of times...

Tonight, I shall say goodbye to the old year with very mixed feelings, and I shall see in the New Year with equal measures of relief and hope, but with the certain knowledge that I shall not live through another year like 2012, because 2013 will be filled with its own trials and triumphs, and its own wonders and woes.

You know what... Life is like that... It always has been, and it always will be, and that’s what makes it so bloody amazing!



2 comments:

  1. Our year has been strangely similar. Full of highs but crashing lows, and a seasonal break of sometimes painful adjustment and renegotiations. So I hope we go into 2013 full of hope and positivity, and see 2012 as a time of many gifts as well as challenges. One of those gifts was my friendship with you, someone who quite different yet someone with whom I seem to have so much in common. Big hugs x

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    Replies
    1. Thanks, Reb,

      There have been times when you've been a real tonic... I can't tell you!

      X

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