"All The Things!" I exclaim every January.
"All The Things?" I ask a week later.
Don't mind me; I am just doing my usual January expectations dance. If dances still had names (what was the Watusi, anyway?) you could call it the Washing Machine: throw a bunch of stuff in there, shake it around, see what you get on the way back out. This year it is the Washing Machine With Added Washi Tape. (I bought a package of 48 tiny rolls from Amazon and my family is a little mystified by how much fun I am having with it. Well, to be honest I am also a little mystified by it, having long been baffled by the appeal of washi tape. But you guys: I have hedgehog washi tape. And pineapples. Also there are some stencils landing in my mailbox on Monday.)
Every year I go back to my resolutions post from the year before, and see what needs to be tweaked, or rebooted, or discarded with a wry and knowing chuckle. I had thought that it would be a little painful to walk through that process this year, because I kept thinking about the stuff I had resolved to do that just didn't get done. I had planned to read a bunch of Victorian literature and only read a little; I had resolved to do some adulting that remained un-adulted or only preliminarily adulted. (Is "adult" a transitive verb? I am not sure it can appear in a passive voice construction. But I suppose if I am going to verb that particular noun I can bend it all the way to my will.) It wasn't actually that bad, but there are some places where I'll need to try try again. That tenure packet, you guys, coupled with the bananapants state of the world in 2018, was not good for my resolver.
I usually make Epiphany resolutions rather than new year's resolutions. The first week of January is a good time for me to think about possibilities and try some things out, and we're almost always on the road near the first of the year. To stick with that plan I'll have to fill in some blanks tomorrow, figuring out how much to emphasize habits vs. goals, and how high to aim. As Robert Browning wrote, a mom's reach should exceed her grasp, or how else will she manufacture a painful mid-February crash with spasms of self-loathing and a side of despair? (I kid! I kid!)
One of the lines on my shiny new habit grid says "L&M (3/wk)" and another says "in bed @ 9:45." Tonight I could only pick one of those things. Sometimes that's how it goes, I guess.
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