New?? Year??

I start this year newly orphaned. Mom died on December 11, 2007. We were planning her 90th birthday party in April. And as usual my sisters and I were aruguing over who was gonna go where and when and who was invited and who wasn’t. She disliked that sort of thing. We were expected to get along.
She was very clear in her expectations. Always. She expected us to do well in school. She expected our behavior to be always proper and for the right reasons. Expected us to do good for the sake of good. Even when we were being done unto. Yep, that's right. She expected us to always be dutiful, to be just and to seek justice. She never expected us to be happy or satisfied, those things were the result of meeting the other expectations, she expected. And she taught us to expect these things as well. She taught by example.

She expected to go to heaven. There was no question. No doubt. She was a dutiful and faithful servant to God her entire life in everything thing she did. She expected that she had a right to expect heaven in return. After all, it was a promise, and God is expected to keep his. No question. Absolute.

I miss her.

I have often seen the sign, the bumper sticker that reads, “If you want Peace, work for Justice’. It has always had a ring of truth to it for me. As I get older I find myself more and more hoping upon hope that there is justice. If someone asked me to describe ‘the after-life’, I would have to put the concept of justice in the description right in there with the concept of peace.

I decided to write this post this morning after turning on the weather report and accidently watching Tim Russert do his schtick about the Iowa caucuses.

I start this year wishing for justice, and to keep working for it, no matter how discouraged I become.
I wish for justice for that fat bastard Tim Russert and his ilk in the press for being what they are and not being what they should be.
I hope for justice for the people in power in our country. I really hope they get justice.

I hope mom gets peace. That would be justice. She worked for it.