Because the new year often is a time for reflection on the old one, and because a friend was asking about high and low points for 2012, I was prompted to review my own personal bests and worsts from the year gone by.

And man, did it go by fast. Is that a function of getting older? It really does seem like just a couple of weeks ago that we were getting cranked up on 2012, and here we are a week into 2013 already.

In any event, here are what I think were my personal best and worst moments of 2012:

Editor:

Every time I read about a child being killed by a vehicle I get a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach. I shake my head and wonder why there are so many needless traffic fatalities.

With a wink and nod when somebody mentions we drive like it’s the Indianapolis speedway or they’re driving like Mario Andretti, we condone the horror of our roadways.

So why do we drive irresponsibly? Because we can.

Does the government encourage it? Traffic fines are built into city’s budgets. If the traffic laws were enforced maybe we would drive slower and better.

How was your 2012?

Plowing through a year’s worth of newspapers puts an interesting perspective on it. Personally, I’d like to think I was a little kinder in the past year. Some of that is simply because there were fewer reasons to make less-kind comments.

Much of 2012 seemed like one long political campaign. At the end we were so focused on the major party presidential candidates, Obama and Romney, that we likely forgot that at first there were more than a half-dozen Republicans fighting for the chance to lose to Obama.