I wake up every morning these days hungover. Headache. Fuzziness. Dry mouth. Which I wouldn’t mind, if I had actually been drinking. Which I haven’t been. So it must be winter. We really need a humidifier.
I had fully intended on doing a bit o’ new year’s reflections, but my plans were thwarted because Adam no longer keeps an at-home work computer. Being tied to my desktop means that I don’t blog. Because if I’m at my desk, the kids aren’t home. And if the kids aren’t home, I’m working on the novel, not writing to you (nothing personal). We’ve budgeted a new laptop for me in March, so perhaps there will be more blogging then. I’m here now because Adam–and his laptop–are home from work and I can use his laptop during his naptime. Truth be told, though, you don’t even have my full attention now, because I’ve discovered the United States of Tara on demand, and I’m working my way through them at this moment. I can try, though, when Toni Collette isn’t distracting me.
My father will quickly dispute that 2010 is not the start of a new decade, but considering I am a sheep, I counted 2000 as the start of the millennium. How odd is it that 1/1/00 doesn’t seem long ago at all. I remember new year’s so clearly, my annual party at Barb and Steve’s, hanging out with Pam, who was a brand new friend from my night-shift stint at a warehouse in McDonough, Georgia, a dry town that housed one of Amazon’s brand new “distribution centers.” I lived alone in Seattle in a small house I had just bought myself three months before. I was not only single (well, sort of single–I was a profuse dater), I hadn’t even met Adam yet (actually, we’ve pieced together that perhaps we had met once, but neither of us registered on the other’s radar). I was still–on paper–an Internet millionaire. I’d just done my first triathlon and I didn’t know it, but in another month, I’d be training for my first and only major bike ride–a double century (in a day when it wasn’t sponsored and was much more rugged–really!).
And now? Well, if you’re here, you know the now. In some ways, I feel like I’ve lived so many lives. New York me. Grad school me. Kibbutz me. Seattle me. And now haus frau me. Each is so distinct and feels so separate and yet so integral to who I am.
So what’s next? Every year I make fairly elaborate new year’s resolutions. Some I keep; most I don’t. I read somewhere that instead of new year’s resolutions you should pick one word to represent the year ahead. I decided to go with this idea. But then I had to come up with a word. What word? At first I thought “focus.” I need to focus on my novel, focus on better eating, focus on the moment. But that didn’t quite encapsulate what I was looking for. So I went with “order.” I want my life in order. Um, no. Passion? Too cheesy. Awareness? Too Zen. Drunk? Closer, but not quite it. So I think this is the year I go resolutionless. And let’s see what I can accomplish.
If only I could get rid of this hangover. Or get a humidifier. Does that count as a resolution? Moisture. Hmmm. Could work…
