happy new year

New Year Intentions

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I resolve…

Probably to break the resolutions I make on the first! I prefer setting goals and intentions rather than “resolutions”. This year, in addition to the traditional lose weight, be kinder, eat out less and cook more, be present, I have decided to set some intentions specifically for my writing. Not writing goals, but writing intentions. Things I intend to do. I discovered this word and process from my memoir teacher (Hi, Mary!). I’m not sure why, but the word (as well as the idea of) intentions sounds more possible, more do-able, and less harsh. It has a gentle feel of the possibility of anticipated accomplishment. It’s not the boss of me, but it’s more than a pie in the sky.

Not only have I decided to set intentions, but I’ve decided to set actual deadlines for some of these intentions. My blog planner has been supportive of setting an editorial calendar for myself, but firm deadlines are foreign to me, and I’ve decided to change that.

I have so many projects that have great potential, some of which I’ve been working on for years. My Wales journey has journal entries from 1987 where it all began, and I’m no closer to a finished product. I have two very special projects that have great potential: St. Kateri’s Shrines and the Labyrinth Prayer Book (working titles only) that I need the impetus to buckle in and move them forward.

That’s where the intentions come in; with setting definitive goals for aspects of their completion, both of which I can see in the near future.

I will possibly share progress under the “writing” tag, and once the calendar turns over to January, I’ll have the next three to six months of deadlines.

Wish me luck. I know I’ll need it and the moral support is invaluable.

Happy New Year, and happy new intentions! May they remain for more than two weeks.

*waves to 2022* *Welcomes 2023*

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As I struggle to write this last post of the year, I think on the last few weeks. (Because honestly, I can’t remember much further back from then without looking at my calendar or camera roll.) My husband and I started watching Wednesday, the Netflix series. I wasn’t sure I wanted to watch it, but one episode later, and I’m hooked. We’re also finishing Derry Girls and tonight we’ll be watching Banshees of Innisherin for our New Year. This is the first year we are home alone with no kids, and I have a series of stress induced stomach flips thinking about where they are and if they’re safe. One is at a hockey game, and two are out with friends. They’re all responsible, but I still worry. That’s the nature of parenting I suppose.

So a few pictures:

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The Year in Review

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Sitting in my living room trying to make a list of what snacks to buy for our “party’ tonight and I suddenly decided (after seeing David and Georgia Tennant’s silver linings video) to make a different sort of list and remember the good things that our family experienced in this year.

At the end of last year, we all looked forward to 2020, not the least of which was its looming roundness of numbers – Twenty Twenty. Barbara Walters, hindsight, leap year, THE election. It was going to be our year – all of our ours…

But it wasn’t quite, was it?

The perfect sentiment from a witch (Rowena on Supernatural)
Pin from Ruth Connell’s design for Stands, Inc. (c)2020

Our biggest blessings were living in New York with a competent state government and a governor who cared about New Yorkers; my husband and oldest continued working, the younger kids continued school, albeit remotely, no one got sick other than a normal mild cold here or there, and for the most part spending all that extra time together, we managed to not want to strangle each other more than the usual amount.

Honestly, we did good.

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HAPPY NEW YEAR!

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It is 2014, and we are in the midst of a snowstorm. I got a text this morning that the schools were closed due to weather. Good thing the schools were already closed due to Christmas vacation. Maybe they were testing the system out.

I can feel things already this year. It’s only a day old and I feel better than I did last January 2nd.

I count New Year’s Eve as a small part of 2014, so I was pleased to talk to my friends who gathered at my best friend’s house for their New Year’s celebration while I was five states away with my family. I have to say I would have liked to have been actively loved, but I did enjoy getting accidentally called while they were singing Carry On Wayward Son. I will say again here that WK made me cry in the good way and I will hold her words in my heart all of this year. I was able to have my closest friends and my family close by for the last day and the first day of the year and that is a good feeling.

I’m starting my good news or something jar with slips of paper. I already have a slip in there.

I’m also starting a daily bloggy/journal thingy. Very late on the 31st I posted a quotation: “Tomorrow is the first blank page of a 365 page book. Write a good one.”

I’ve decided to post something, probably short daily and tagged with 365 and then I’ll see what I’ve got at the end of the year.

I’m still working on resolutions, but they will be more like goals and hope-to-dos and I’m planning on more moments of self-accountability.

I plan to focus on three main writing topics in addition to whatever pops into my mind and my memoir workshops and fandom and they will be Depression, Faith and my House, more specifically my horrendous home-buying/mortgage experience. All of these are where my heart and mind always went to in my daily life and not only will talking about my experiences help my own therapy, I think that I can offer things to people suffering through depression with how I’ve been helped.

I’m looking forward to this year, and I haven’t felt that way in a very long, long time.

So, good tidings and blessings and happiness for the next 363 days and beyond that arbitrary calendar date.

KB