It is still 2016 when I write these words, although the ball drop is quickly approaching.

It has been a long, difficult year. I did not imagine, one year ago, what this year would hold, although in retrospect, all the elements were presenting themselves to me, waiting to be deciphered.

It was a perfect storm of challenges on nearly every level – my body, relationships, career and personal responsibilities all screamed for my attention, and I (mostly) did not address any of them sufficiently. What remained was an unshakable sense of constantly being behind.

I was blindsided by the degree to which I had formulated a life based on a set of beliefs that were just not true. (It’s a process I work with over and over, with every client. I had just forgotten to do it myself. Oops.)

I look forward to 2017, mostly because it is not 2016, in the same way tomorrow is not today.

I breathe into the feeling of it, and the knowing of it, and I allow it all to reside, conflict-free, within me. There is a sense of deep grief for all that has died this year. Because I believe in the ‘rightness’ of it all, even when drowning in ‘wrongness’, there is more to allow.

I remember and acknowledge all those hands who have pushed, pulled, lifted and held me. When my own mother was not able, other mothers made themselves known.

I remember the magical and miraculous. (One example: the emergence of my daughter as a human being who makes everything worth it.)

I have been thinking deeply about the differences between my life, and the life of the women before me. Some may say I had it infinitely easier. Others may realize the existential difficulties that brew in the human psyche, even when it all looks perfectly fine.

I want to sit and ponder, reviewing the past, planning for the future, but something prevents me from settling.

Instead, I spend most of the last 24 hours of 2016 vigorously cleaning my house. We have just returned from a big trip (as well as some surprise home remodeling) so there is plenty of laundry, dusting, sweeping, organizing and reinstating order that needs to be done.

Then, well past a reasonable time for cooking, I am called to the kitchen. To make something that brings what’s important into sharp resolve. I pour my discomfort and angst into the simmering sauces on my stovetop and the rhythm of a sharp knife on a wood board.

And finally, a poem, to honor all that came before me, is born. From it, the recognition of the thread that tugs me forward, that connects me backward, and that reassures me that all is as it should be.

I wish I could have shared the pois sauce, a staple of my childhood, with you. I wish that tall, thin, angry woman who set aside all her suffering to create miracles in the kitchen, could have also sat with us.

I don’t wish you a happy new year. I know better. I honor your experience and the alchemy of your soul’s journey toward whatever it needs.

I send you love and gratitude. Together, we move toward or away from what awaits us. I trust neither you or I are behind. The gift of a new day is proof enough.