Two much-loved relatives have passed away peacefully after short but sudden illnesses, both well before their time, even if one was 76. My children's great-grandmother is about to turn 100 next month, but not everyone gets a full innings of good health, and it's been very sad for my extended family, on both sides, to say goodbye.
A wonderful quote about loss whose author, unfortunately, I can't find to credit:
"Grief I've learned is really just love. It's all the love you want to give but cannot. All of that unspent love gathers up in the corners of your eyes, the lump in your throat and in that hollow part of your chest. Grief is just love with no place to go."
Something else encountered recently is the phrase "generational warfare". It's being used to describe the apparent political battle happening between millennials and baby-boomers over housing, superannuation and other pressure points. I'm a Gen X, in the middle somewhere, although grateful for still being considered young ... at least sometimes.
Today, we have a chance to hear from a true millennial voice, 22-year-old Chloe Swarbrick, who's visiting Whanganui to talk about the importance of youth engagement in politics.
Ranked 13th on the Green Party initial list, Ms Swarbrick came third in the Auckland mayoralty last year, receiving nearly 30,000 votes, and has law and arts degrees. She's already been busy as an entrepreneur, setting up a fashion label, an artists' pop-up market, a digital consultancy, and a cafe and gallery. Phew, I'm tired (again) just listing these achievements.
That said, Ms Swarbrick doesn't buy into these "us and them" arguments, saying it shifts the focus away from the real issues, so I'm looking forward to hearing her take at Article Cafe and then the market this morning.
One of those "real" issues that has hit home again this week is the impact of climate change on our day-to-day lives.
The tail-end of Cyclone Debbie is not just a weather bomb - it is, perhaps, an example of the increased extreme events we will experience with changing climate. Our one-in-100 year floods description doesn't mean they happen only once in 100 years, at least not any more.
We need stronger national leadership (and at international level - don't get me started on Trump's cuts to the Environmental Protection Agency in the US) to do our bit to limit the global increase in temperature to 1.5 degrees to reduce these impacts.
Speaking of leadership, I've been impressed with mayor Hamish McDouall this week - well done for stepping up and taking action when the modelling was looking scary. There's no guarantee rain will fall exactly where and when predicted and we scraped through.
Thanks, too, to the team at Horizons. While I might see serious work to be done on One Plan implementation coming out of this week's Environment Court decision, they've done a stellar job as part of the Civil Defence team co-ordinating the response to this weather.
Events like this give good people a chance to shine and I'm blown away but not surprised by the stories of generosity and care in our community. Whanganui, you have excelled.
-Nicola Patrick is a Horizons regional councillor, a Sustainable Whanganui trustee and works for Te Kaahui o Rauru. A mother of two boys, she has a science degree and is the Green Party's Whanganui candidate.
