My New Year's Wish

Whew! Well kids, we managed to stumble through another year without destroying the world. 2005 managed to be a banner year for me, topping even 2003, when I got to travel to England on the company dime, and 2004, when I finally got published. While 2005 started out in a fairly typical manner (read: James was drunk) it ended on a very high note. In the last four months of the year I found a new job (which I love) and as a consequence, FINALLY, the James has returned to Houston (which I also love.)

Thank God.

I made some new friends and reconnected with some old friends.

Oh yeah, and I started the Opiate of the Masses. After mocking blogs and bloggers for some time, I finally broke down and managed to churn out just over 65,000 words on here for your reading pleasure.

All in all it was really a good year and I am somewhat sad to see it go. Such is life.

This brings us to the new year; 2006.

I am not a fan of doing the New Year’s Resolution thing. I never keep them. Ever. So this year I decided I would have a New Years Wish rather than a Resolution.

This year’s wish came to me while I was listening to the BBC World Service. They were talking with a Palestinian school teacher from Gaza who had experienced the Israeli occupation in a most personal and invasive way. The Israeli Army took over the top floor of his two-storey house and used it as a look-out post. They also removed all of the orange and olive trees that were in his yard. Despite everything he has been through he still does not hate the Israelis. He wishes for peace and understanding.

My wish and prayer is that his orange trees grow back and bloom again. That’s it.

(I cannot remember what day I heard this story, and I was not able to find anything on the BBC’s website that appeared to be this story.)