I admit that I’m kind of awful at New Year’s types of thoughts. I can never really pull off a list of resolutions that I actually can keep, I am not all that great at looking back and saying, “See, this is what we did in the last year!” because I barely have a grip on what I did yesterday. It’s kind of a problem, actually. But, I’ve been thinking about this, because I realize it’s not just the end of a year, but the end of another decade, and everyone is doing those huge retrospective types of essays – best books, best films, best movies – worst weather –blah, blah blah, so I’ve been forced into thought.
(Don’t you hate it when that happens?)
I can only look at this retrospective in terms of Most Changes. My life has really changed in the last ten years.
Let me count the ways: first trip to Europe. Three changes from apartment to house to another house, in three different town. First home purchased. Graduate school for Tech Boy. MFA for me. Nephew One. Move to Scotland. First visit to Eastern Europe and Italy. Nephew Two.
Life is not all smooth sailing. Other enormous changes – less personal, in one way, and more personal, in another, happened, too. Sometimes the changes that happen to other people are the worst, because you can no longer assume that they are exactly the same person that you knew. My older sister eloped with someone none of us had ever met – surprise! My eldest sister graduated with a double Master’s degree, and the following autumn, found out she had cancer. Losing two aunts and an uncle – on the same side of the family – to the same disease in the last ten years means looking down the voracious gullet of a very scary beast. My grandmother, incapacitated by Alzheimer’s, watches me at times with suspicion-clouded eyes…
Big challenges, these. The type that put a mirror in front of you, force you to look at what is, and to consider who you are, and who you could be.
The economy in 2009 alone has been so horrific that almost everyone I know has been rocked. I know very well that we are among the fortunate ones. Only one lay off in this ten year span, one financial shortfall that wasn’t planned. The boat has rocked, but we haven’t gone under. How could we, with the buoying blessing of me achieving my dream of being published, and finding a receptive editor for not one, but two books? How could we, with the insane – yet insanely energizing – adventure of moving lock, stock and barrel to the UK for four years while Tech Boy pursues his PhD? How could we, held close by our friends, who join vicariously in our wanderlust, and keep us linked to them with stories of their own journeys? A few sharp storms, this past year. A few squalls which blew us into seas unknown. But we sail on.
So, you’ve already got your resolutions list written? Seriously? I have an idea or two on what I’m going to be doing next year.
I’m going to write. I’m going to read. I’m not sure about the other details…
I might learn to crochet. I could stop eating chocolate. Eventually I’ll send out all my Christmas packages (D’oh!). Anything could happen.
And that remains the finest part of the new year, for me – the not-knowing. The plain, unblemished page of the unknown. Nothing planned, nothing quite certain, except the inevitable dues of the body and the demands of the government, also known as Death & Taxes. Other than that, everything else is up in the air, held aloft by expectation.
Unrivaled possibility.
It’s time to pull up the anchor. A wind is rising and filling our sails, propelling us into a new year. The name of the wind is Hope.
Happy New Year. In 2010, may you discover that you are better at living than you could have ever dreamed you would be.