Catoctin Clarion

New Year Reflections
Nineteen twenty-three is dawning.
We have reached another milestone in our journey here on earth. A fitting time, someone has said, to pause and look back over the past year and criticise ourselves. Those of us who, as yet, have our life work before us, are we much better fitted for the work than we were last year? And those of us who are older and entered upon our share in the work of the world, are we making the best of it? Is the world any better off for our having lived in it for another year?
Are we doing the things which we intended to do, or are we putting them off for another time? These, and a thousand other questions we might ask ourselves as we review the old year; but whatever conclusions we may come to we surely must agree on one point, namely, that we must make each year count for something.
But enough of retrospecting. We have now a clean New Year spread out before us, boundless in its opportunities. We must now look forward hoping for the best but ever ready for the worst that fate may have in store for us.
"Trust in God and do something" is a good motto to keep in mind. But beware lest you undervalue those two words "do something." There are volumes of advice in them. The years seem short enough in which to do anything, and they will seem shorter and shorter as we grow older and our lives become fuller and busier, and alas, we have but comparatively few of them in this earthly life before we are swept across the Great Divide into a vast Eternity, which has no milestones and no limits. As Longfellow beautifully says it:
"Let us then be up and doing With a heart for any fate."
Geraldine Fitez, '25