Decembeard 2014

Well this is another Decembeard selfie but this time it is marking the last day of the fundraising effort as of course today is the last day of December.  I have raised £590 so far for Beating Bowel Cancer by growing this beard and I am grateful to all those who have been so generous in supporting this, the charity who provided me with so much vital information throughout the last ten months.

This year started out celebrating with friends and was at the time full of new hope for the future, as we had experienced a few tough years.  However, only two months in, I was diagnosed with bowel cancer and that new hope rapidly unravelled, or more accurately, it disintegrated.  Obviously it is impossible to ignore what has happened to me this year but I always look to New Year as a threshold for new beginnings and therefore I will be happy to put 2014 firmly behind me.

Of course, life has its ups and downs and therefore the higher points of 2014 cannot be ignored: my illness has meant that I have spent most of the year to regain my fitness and to carry on with the ordinary things in life while accommodating the physical changes brought about by the major surgery I had in March.  Consequently, the two caravan holidays we had this year (May half term and Summer) were so much more special due to the fact that there was a risk that I wouldn’t be fit enough to cope with them.  We went to the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow, something I couldn’t just put off until I was better, and to the Edinburgh Royal Military Tattoo, so they felt so much more special as they felt like more of a challenge.  We also made it to Centre Parcs at Halloween to make up for the holiday we cancelled at Easter, just three weeks after my surgery.

So, we have reached the end of the year and tomorrow will be the first day of 2015 and therefore another opportunity for a fresh beginning.  None of us knows what is around the corner and I have always taken the view that we should live for today but make provision for tomorrow and, as the bells ring out at midnight tonight, I will take the positive message from that into 2015 as I intend to make the most of life.

I wish you all a very, very happy and prosperous 2015.