Promises, promises, promises

When they’re everywhere, this time of year, how do you swear off these as a resolution?

One of my friends recently announced to me that he was going to get fit in 2017. Another promised she would eat more sensibly starting this week. And I read about others who proclaimed this next calendar year they would be kinder, more forthright, better listeners, less ideological, more philanthropic and take up volunteering – all noble objectives, I should add. Eventually somebody asked me if I’d made any resolutions. Well, I chickened out. I chose a kind of joke, one of my father’s regular Jan. 1 comebacks to the question.

“Yup,” I said. “My resolution is to … not make any resolutions!” (more…)

Rescuers with no names

Crosby in Team Canada dressing room at Vancouver Olympics in 2010.
Crosby in Team Canada dressing room at Vancouver Olympics in 2010.

It was the day before New Year’s Day, four years ago. I had simply gone to exchange a gift at an electronics store in Oshawa. As I drove home that midday I remember listening to former Detroit Red Wings star Steve Yzerman announcing names of Team Canada hockey players for the 2010 Winter Olympics.

That’s when I was T-boned by a truck coming through an intersection. I remember my world spinning until I hit something else and came to an abrupt stop facing the opposite direction in the intersection. Next thing I knew, not an official, just a guy with a cell phone in his hand came to what was left of my driver’s side window.

“Are you OK?” he asked.

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