A Page A Day

I don't do New Year's Resolutions, as a thing. They last for a week and then it's guilt city, and who needs that hassle? I have enough self-inflicted hassles already, thankyouverymuch. 

That said, I think that the end of the year is a good time to look back at how the year balanced out. Work is work - do the work and get paid for the work - but were there more satisfying or stressful days? Was time spent volunteering rewarding or frustrating? Did I spend time on social media spinning the scroll bar, or use social sites to stay in touch with friends and family, learn new things, or be inspired by the creativity of others? What did we do to connect as a family? What did I do to further my own ideas, dreams, goals? 

Some years, though, all that analysis is just waaay too much. 2022 was like that. Old friends lost to distance, time, or the Reaper, unrealized ideas, plans, goals, everything. So, New Year's 2023 was a day of looking forward, not back. 

A (not-lost!) old friend writes a blog about the books he reads, and it's fun and interesting to see his thoughts, especially about books I've also read. Taking his consistent focus as inspiration, I set a tiny goal of reading a bit of a non-digital book each day, and along with that, to do something creative daily. 

One page, one knitted row or other small crafty thing, less than five minutes, take a photo to track progress. I could do that. 

I was consistent for a couple of months, then got distracted by other things for a bit, but then went back into book-world later in the year, and the end result (according to the tracking tag in GoodReads) was 52 books for the year. Not all hardcopy, and not all first-reads, but an average of a book each week for the year? I'll take it. 

And Fourteen Years Later....

 ...here we are. 

This post has been lounging in drafts since 2020, and it's finally time to get back into writing. (So says the squirrel-brain, for today, at least...)

2020 was the weirdest year - pandemic shutdowns, work from home, then in the fall, back into the office but in a new position, busy busy. Fortunately, the kids were old enough to manage virtual learning, we all stayed healthy, and I loved working from home this time around. (My first wfh experience was after many years of being on Uncle Sam's schedule, and with a three-year-old in the house at that time, work-life balance was...well. Let's just say, it wasn't.)

2020 was also the beginning of a new decade of good things happening. Graduations, flying the nest, new positions, life changes. Young adults starting on their own journeys. 

And now, in 2024, the young adults are still young adulting, and we're making adjustments around the house to reflect our new normal. 

I've started curating some longstanding collections and moving along the things I don't need to keep around anymore, to free up breathing space, both literally and metaphorically. It's time to switch off the autopilot mindset of continuing on well-trodden paths just because they're familiar, relook my goals and priorities, and step forward in a more intentional way.