Saying goodbye

When my brother was about four years old, he had a pair of navy blue shorts which he wore every d a y.

It was later too small, frayed and stained.

My mother threw it in the dustbin, even tried to hide it away, but the very next day, lo and behold, he was wearing them again!

It was difficult for him to say goodbye to those favourite shorts that had accompanied him up to the tree house, that went fishing with him in the river and was a buffer against a (sometimes well deserved) hiding.

To say goodbye to things and people are always sad and sometimes traumatic, and there are of course many different kinds and ways of saying goodbye.

There is the “never-to-be-seen-again” goodbye next to the deathbed of a loved one.

Or even when you have to put a family pet down.

Then there are the other goodbyes.

These are the ones you have to make consciously after lots of consideration, often accompanied with heartache, pain and a severe sense of loss.

We are nearing the end of the year, when most of us are starting to think of saying goodbye to old habits, to people who are not contributing positively to our lives, to all kinds of abuse, to unsatisfactory jobs.

Let us not hold onto those old, ragged shorts any longer.

Say your goodbyes and start preparing a brand-new list of New Year’s resolutions!

Say goodbye to your old pair of frayed and stained shorts, and go and buy yourself a pair of new shorts! Ones that bring believe, hope and love!