As we roll into 2025, those extrapolating the past year—Gaza, Sudan, Ukraine, a new US president, countless deaths through forced migrations—may wonder if Hope exists.
A 99-year-old war veteran, painfully pushing his walker round and round his garden every day to raise £1,000 for medical staff, receives £17 MILLION in countless donations from across the UK; former female teachers in Afghanistan risk their lives to impart knowledge to school-age girls; a policeman in the USA runs to free a man trapped in his car, stuck on a rail line seconds before a train smashes the car to smithereens.
The single mother in Canada daily nurturing and championing her autistic son, with no time for herself. A lady in her 70s regularly risking travel through snow blizzard and black ice to visit her ailing sister 60 kms away, to clean house and take her to doctors’ appointments. The couple struggling daily to cope with their fentanyl-addicted son, desperate to protect him from harm and into rehab. Every parent of school age kids, preparing never-ending lunch bags and sports bags, fighting each day to get their kids out of the house on time and into after-school hockey or dancing. Parents who husband their parents suffering from dementia.
Like the 99-year-old, it isn’t just what they do but the generosity and assistance of those around them inspiring hope to help them survive, if not thrive.
Hope, actually, is all around us.
