resolution adjacent

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Some Gentle Aspirations for 2022

Time for some non-resolutions! As per tradition, I am setting some gentle aspirations, rather than goals. These are simply a testament to what seems important now, and when I review them at the end of the year, they will help me better understand my priorities over time. I refuse to feel bad about failing to accomplish any of them, except for the writing-related ones, which I already feel bad about not achieving years ago. 

In addition to the aspirations I may or may not complete, I would also like to state that I am making some resolutions that I am NEARLY CERTAIN of completing, either because I have already completed them prior to this writing, or because I am on the precipice of completing them in mere days. That is the power of posting one’s goals on the internet. I can decide which goals to post, and maybe I have already achieved them, and that is my business and I will be delighted to count them as complete. It is the equivalent of writing a to-do list where the first item is “wake up” and the second item is “write to-do list.” It feels good to cross things off the list and momentum is important! For instance, I encourage you to put “put away holiday décor” on your own list of resolutions, even if you stowed the last ornament days ago. Then you are already ahead of the game!

For sake of honesty, however, I will alert you to any of these goals that are already half complete. Because I don’t want to cheat anyone, not you, certainly, and not my future self, who will be super annoyed that I have halved her feeling of accomplishment at year’s end but who will also appreciate my sense of ethics. 

Personal

Aspiration: Read 50 books. In 2021, I read 74 books. That doesn’t seem replicable, but I think 50 is an achievable goal. 

Aspiration: Work out 5 days a week. This is an oldie but a goodie. I need to get back into regular exercise, and I know it can be done. 

Aspiration: Read a poem every day. I am semi-stealing this aspiration from Nicole, who read Rumi every day last year. Wow. That is A Feat. But it inspired me. However, I am not going to limit myself to Rumi, or to a single poet. I have an entire bookcase FULL of poetry and yet I rarely read poems! This must stop. Poetry is an essential part of life, and I can so easily grab a random book off my shelves each evening, and flip to a random poem each morning rather than reaching for my phone. 

Aspiration: Buy some new shirts that make me feel cute and not like a slob. Listen, you know I am All For stay-at-home clothes. But I have discovered over the past somethingish months that I would like to feel cute in clothes when I inevitably am forced to leave the house, and I do not feel cute in clothing that doesn’t fit me. This is one of those goals that I may have almost achieved even as I write this: I ordered two shirts from Nordstrom with a Christmas gift card. But I am cautious. The new shirts could look… not good. So I may still have this feat ahead of me. 

Aspiration: Come up with a workable weekly schedule. This stems from a middle-of-the-night attempt to come up with a schedule for myself, allowing for maximum writing and revising time, but also slotting in time for working out, eating, and blog stuff. Which led me to determine that there aren’t enough hours in the day and I need to “wake up at 5:00 and go to bed at 10:00 every day,” when I don’t know if that’s doable. Okay. I’m pretty sure it’s not. What I need to do instead is to come up with a few different versions of a schedule, try it out, and then figure out what combination of timings and tasks works for me. 

Aspiration: Try baked oatmeal. This is a late addition, because I somehow forgot about how badly I want to try baked oatmeal after our breakfast convo the other day (she says, as though it wasn’t in early November). For some reason, it intimidates me. Mainly because I really really don’t like oatmeal. But this sounds more like a cookie than like hot mush, and it gets such high praise, and I am going to try it. 

Reach Aspiration: Leave my phone upstairs unless I leave the house. This is laughable to even attempt, isn’t it. And yet I have done this, multiple times, and feel such a sense of freedom from the pull of email and social media when I do. If I could do this on a daily basis, just think of all the work I could get done! 

Family

Aspiration: Eat more vegetables. If you think this aspiration seems as though it should belong to the Personal category, you would be correct. But I am the meal planner and dinner maker in this house, so I have a certain amount of vegetable wielding power around here. We could all do with more veg on our plates. 

Aspiration: Do more non-screen things together. Listen, we have a good amount of Family Togetherness around here, which is a wonderful blessing. But a lot of our time together involves a PlayStation or a TV. We can do better than that. If we ever get snow, we will go skiing and sledding. Once the weather warms up and dries out, we can go biking. When the weather, as is typical, absolutely sucks, we can play the wide variety of board games we own. If we don’t want to play the ones we own, we can buy more of the murder mystery games we enjoy. This is doable. 

Aspiration: Do less “forcing” of my will on the family. This is semi-stolen from/inspired by Swistle. (Maybe the connection is only in my head, because her resolution is very different from mine.) I have noticed that a lot of things don’t happen unless I nag and badger and harp. That’s not fun for anyone, INCLUDING ME. For instance, we were supposed to make sticky toffee pudding for New Year’s Eve dinner. Dessert. You know what I mean. But even though I washed the potatoes and broccoli well in advance of dinnertime, no movement was made by anybody else to prepare anything for the dessert. Then my husband decided at a very late moment – like 4:00 or 5:00 pm – that he wanted to work out. Which is great! Exercise! I am fine with that! But then when he was done, it was much too late to do anything, including make the fancy dinner we had planned, and especially making sticky toffee pudding. We did end up making the steak and potatoes and broccoli, which were delicious, but we didn’t make the pudding. And we didn’t make it yesterday, either, even though we were Going To Make It, because once again he got caught up playing video games with Carla and then at 5:00 pm wanted to work out and lost track of the time. This is fine! It’s prioritization at work! It is not enough of a priority for him to note the time and stop playing video games. It is not enough of a priority for me to do all the work of making sticky toffee pudding by myself. So it didn’t happen. It could have happened, if I had called down to him that we needed to get started if we wanted to have sticky toffee pudding for dinner. But the thing is, it is not my job to be Ultimate Time Monitor. It just isn’t. So I wrote a blog post and drank a cocktail while he worked out, and we did not make sticky toffee pudding, and maybe we won’t do it today either, who knows? There are three of us in this family, and it is not my sole responsibility to keep everything on track. That’s not fair, and it’s not fun, and no one likes the Time Badger, least of all the Time Badger herself. Some things are going to fall by the wayside. And sometimes that will cause some pain. And maybe that pain will inspire a change in behavior, though I am not optimistic. 

Aspiration: Go on some dates with my husband. We went on three (outdoor, rainy) dates in 2021. We now have a good babysitter to call on, should we need her, and one of these days we may decide to brave a restaurant. But even if all our dates take place in the summer, outside, that is fine! I just want to spend some time ALONE with my husband, AWAY from our house.

Reach Aspiration: Have friends over for dinner. We have been to two friends’ homes this past year, and if nothing else, etiquette requires that we return the favor. But also I would like to entertain again. A little bit. Maybe.

Reach Aspiration: Stop treating Carla’s needs as if they are mine.  Brought to you by Girl Scout Cookie Selling Season, which is my own personal hell and yet which is somehow My Thing instead of my husband’s. But that’s only one example of many. This is a two-fold aspiration. First, Carla is eight-and-a-half and can do with more responsibility. Second, just because I am The Mom doesn’t mean that I am automatically responsible for Carla’s laundry in addition to my own, for Carla’s meals in addition to my own, for Carla’s whatever-whatever. We are so fortunate to have two parents in this household, and I should allow/enable the other parent to do just as much as I do. Sure, some things will always fall to me because of my husband’s job (making and attending appointments, for instance). I think, for awhile, this will involve things like answering questions about “what does Carla normally eat with her chicken nuggets?” but perhaps that will be a worthwhile endeavor. See also the related issue of Putting Away Rags and Hand Towels Is Not My Sole Responsibility. 

Work/Finance

Aspiration: Revise my manuscript and start querying agents. Everything I read says that the agent-seeking stage is soul destroying. I am going to do it anyway. Check back at year’s end to see if I have fragments of soul remaining.

Aspiration: Finish my second manuscript. This second manuscript is a thriller, and I think it will be quicker and simpler than the first one. I just need to figure out the ending and WRITE IT. That is in the wrong order. I need to WRITE IT and figure out the ending.

Aspiration: Get a financial advisor. This is another one of those goals that I have already all but completed! My husband and I met with a financial advisor, and he is supposedly looking over our haphazard finances at the moment, and all we need to do is sign an agreement and let him HELP US make wise financial decisions! Side note: Carla asked us if he was a man. Her follow-up question was whether all financial advisors are men. Her follow-up to that was whether we knew any of these supposedly-existing women financial advisors. This line of questioning kind of made me wish that I had found a woman financial advisor. But it was hard enough to find THIS GUY and get up the nerve to meet with him, so I am moving forward as is.

Reach Aspiration: Take a writing class. I want to take a class about writing short stories (I am not good at writing things that are short) (you: YES WE ARE AWARE) or maybe about writing a personal essay. This terrifies me. 

Home/Property

Aspiration: Install a gallery wall in the living room. This one is BACK ON THE LIST, baby! You have kindly supported me and offered me reasonable suggestions for accomplishing this goal by myself many times, and still I have balked. You must first understand that I am incapable of making straight lines. “But use a ruler,” you say. No, even with a ruler, my lines somehow get distracted and wander off. So my husband MUST be involved in this project, because he is the yin to my yang, the meticulous to my slapdash. You must second understand that my husband was originally GUNG HO with this project, many years ago when it first appeared on my list of totally achievable desires. And that he then decided, at some point, unbeknownst to me, that it was MY project, and I should be in charge. That’s where things broke down. Because while I am willing to say “we should have a gallery wall in the living room,” I am unwilling to be the sole person dictating which items appear on said wall, which is co-owned and co-utilized and co-looked-at by other people in our family. And also, even if I could just go balls to the wall (unintentional pun) (but disturbing/perplexing imagery when I call out said pun and visualize it) (why is “balls to the wall” even a phrase? I have never thought deeply about it before and never want to do so again) full steam ahead and pick out a bunch of artwork, I simply cannot install it in a way that would look purposeful and not like a feeble earthquake had come through and jostled everything on the walls. My husband refused to care about the project. I refused to move forward. The project died. This is very long. This past fall, my husband and daughter and I went on a road trip, and found a little gallery that had lots of fun things, including a painting by a local artist of our state bird. We wanted very badly to buy the painting, but I said that I couldn’t in good conscience purchase it, knowing that I wanted it to be on the gallery wall, and knowing also that the gallery wall would not happen. This turned out to be a carrot, friends! A carrot! My husband said something like, “Well, if I promise to help you realize your gallery wall dreams, can we get the painting?” Marital compromise at work! And I agreed and we bought the painting and it has remained in its paper wrapping since August. But now, NOW, we are on the threshold of a gallery wall! Supposedly! Let’s refrain from holding our breaths. 

Aspiration: Hire someone to redo our ceiling and paint our trim. I am including this as one aspiration because a friend suggested a person who supposedly does both. 

Aspiration: Hire someone to fix our fridge. Our fridge leaks. It makes constant musical noises at us to alert us that Something Is Wrong. It has done this for… years, now. I have been afraid to have someone look at it because I fear that the only answer is to buy a new fridge. But it’s time. It’s time. 

Aspiration: Clean our basement and finalize a craft space for Carla. This is another aspiration that is all but complete. We spent the last week of December doing a DRASTIC CULL of our basement, and it looks as fabulous as a basement storage area can look. We also set up the craft-space items Carla received from Santa, and are in the process of finalizing it all. There is still much to be done (I need to cull THREE boxes of Precious Baby Items to ONE, for instance) (plus we need to buy a rug to go underneath the craft area), but it is well on the way. 

Reach Aspiration: PAINT THE BASEBOARDS MY GOD IT HAS BEEN 11 YEARS. Why is this a reach aspiration, you wonder? Well. My baseboards have been dark forest green for eleven years, that’s why. 

I think that’s PLENTY for this year, Internet. Wish me luck! 

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Extra Gentle Aspirations for 2021

Despite… everything… I want to continue with my now two-year-old tradition of coming up with a few aspirations for the year ahead.  I do. But these goals are VERY optimistic. And I am going to be especially gentle on myself, I think. 

Personal

Aspiration: Read 40 books. I read 46 books in 2020 – a personal record. Given that sometimes I can devour a book in a day and other times I read nothing at all for weeks on end, it’s hard to say whether I will ever meet this goal. But it’s fun to track.

Aspiration: Exercise five days a week. This is the same goal from last year and seems worthwhile to try for again.

Aspiration: Buy new towels. My bath towels are twelve years old. I use them daily and they refuse to be soft anymore and NO MATTER WHAT I do they have a very faint whiff of mildew.  It seems easy enough to just… buy new towels.  But no. It is not that straightforward. My husband is the first hurdle; they are not his so they don’t affect him, plus I do have other even older towels I could use (but they are blue and our bathroom color scheme is GREY). And then also I feel so wasteful and frivolous, because they still DRY. And I do have the blue backup towels. And some people don’t even have ANY towels. But they are uncomfortable and faintly smelly and I want new ones, so I’m putting it on the list.

Aspiration: Stop looking at my phone while in bed. There is absolutely ZERO benefit in scrolling through my news feed when I am trying to fall asleep. Reading a book is SO MUCH BETTER for my mental health. 

Aspiration: Stop drinking anything after nine p.m. This is kind of dumb, but I tend to drink a mug of tea late in the evening… and then I am up every hour to pee all night long and it is NOT restful. So perhaps I can just… not do that? 

Aspiration: Make focaccia. Listen, we have to have some FUN aspirations, right? I have long wanted to make focaccia. Every time I see a focaccia recipe, I ogle it. I have even headed into several weeks of the past ten months fully intending to make focaccia. But it has never come to pass. This is the year, Internet. The year of focaccia!

Reach Aspiration: Cut my own hair. This sounds bonkers, I know. I can’t cut a straight line to save my life; how can I possibly cut my own hair? But it is coming up on a year since I last had a haircut, and my hair is long enough that it could (probably) survive even a botched little trim; I could simply go get a professional haircut if I make a mess of it. I have watched extensive YouTube videos about how to do it, and it seems fairly straightforward. Perhaps I can persuade my husband to do it for me? He cuts his own hair and is very meticulous and steady-handed. Can I make “persuade my husband to cut my hair” a goal for the year ahead?

Family

Aspiration: Buy bikes for the adults and go on bike rides as a family. If the bikes my husband and I have been looking at since literally last April ever come back in stock, we can make this happen.

Aspiration: Get out of the house, as a family, every single weekend to Do Something. This obviously will depend heavily on the status of the pandemic, but even a walk around the neighborhood counts. I just need to inspire us to LEAVE THE HOUSE.

Reach Aspiration: Have a family game night once a month. We LOVE playing games together, but so rarely do during “normal” life. I think it would be really lovely to try to dedicate a day to doing it purposefully. Carla is at a great age for games now, which opens up a bunch of new options. This is a reach because a) my family might not buy in and b) it’s likely I will forget about this.

Reach Aspiration: Figure out how to see my parents this summer. Should the pandemic continue apace, we will obviously continue to stay home. But if it slackens a little, I would really, really like to visit my parents. They have a guest house where Carla and I could stay and quarantine, if that became necessary, so the real hurdle is getting there. Flying makes me Very Nervous. But perhaps we could get a private berth on a train? Then rent a car when we arrived in their state? A train ride would be A Big Fun Adventure for me and Carla to undertake together (my husband would not be able to join us because he wouldn’t be able to leave work for enough time to complete a quarantine), but when last I looked at train tickets, the price was too high to be worth it. Perhaps if we stayed with my parents long enough, it would be worthwhile?

Work/Finance

Aspiration: Revise my manuscript and get it to beta readers. This has to happen. It is my number one priority. 

Aspiration: Look for a writing class or writing group. Note that this is not an aspiration to JOIN a writing class or writing group; we are being extra gentle. But I am thinking it might be useful, at this stage of the writing process, to find an online group of writers who are working on fine-tuning their manuscripts or learning how to write query letters or are workshopping chapters together… I’m not sure what I WANT, but I want to look into it. That’s it, that’s the goal. THEN I can decide whether I actually want to sign up for whatever it is I’ve found.

Aspiration: Put money into a personal 401(k). Again, there is no excuse for not doing this. 

Reach Aspiration: Get a first draft of manuscript #2. This is ridiculous, when I haven’t gotten through a proper revision of the FIRST manuscript, but once I do, I want to jump right into the second novel, which already has about 40,000 words. 

Home/Property

Aspiration: Touch up the outside of the house. We need to repaint the trim.

Aspiration: Deal with the tree issues in our backyard. We have SO MANY issues. The first is that the large oak in the backyard has some sort of fungus. I want to figure out how to address it. The second is that the arborvitae that line three sides of our yard are in rough shape. Some have been devastated by heavy snow and harsh winds, others have been ravaged by hungry deer. It looks terrible and I need to figure out how to take care of it. I think it is going to cost a lot of money, yikes.

Aspiration: Get a fake Christmas tree. This is not really my aspiration; it’s my husband’s. But he gets so grouchy about buying a real tree and setting it up and putting the lights on it that it really harshes my happy Christmas buzz. So I have come around to thinking a pre-lit artificial tree would be a blessing. We have looked for trees in the past, but haven’t ever gone through with the purchase because the one we want is either too expensive or sold out. They haven’t gotten LESS expensive, but I think we’ve mainly gotten over the initial price resistance. Now all we need to do is find the one we want when it is available.

Reach Aspiration: Hire someone to repaint the interior of the house. My parents apparently had someone repaint the house every five years, which boggles my mind. But now it has been ten years since we’ve lived here, and I can see signs that the house needs repainting. The biggest problem areas are the ceilings, believe it or not: they are not popcorn ceilings, but they have a texture, and in the kitchen and bathrooms especially, paint is peeling off of some of the textured areas. 

We shall see how many of these aspirations come to fruition, Internet! I am hopeful and game… but we shall see!

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2017 Round-Up-a-Rama

Welcome to the yearly recap! Which I am doing purely because Tradition and not because I want to!

Okay, and also for completeness. And also out of a sense of reciprocity, because I want to read YOUR recap. Link me to it in the comments, pretty please? I need some early 2018 reading.

(This yearly recap originated with Linda of All & Sundry. If you’re so inclined, you can read past versions of my responses: 2016, 2015, 2014, 2013, 2012, 2011, 2010, 2009.) (Holy moly, I’ve been doing this nonsense a long time.)

  • What did you do in 2017 that you’d never done before?

This is one of the questions I am beginning to find tiresome about this recap. (You may recall that last year I began throwing out questions that irritated me. This hasn’t made the reject list… yet.) Perhaps if my life were full of Once In A Lifetime Events, it would be less so. Well. I shall keep it if ONLY because next year I will have something to add. (Don’t get too excited.)

Anyway. The thing I did this year that I’d never done before was attending a weeklong writers’ conference. It was amazing, packed full of valuable information, exhausting, and 100% worthwhile.

  • Did you keep your New Year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year?

Last year, I said:

This year, I am going to finish the novel. That’s my primary goal. It’s taking so much longer than I anticipated just to eke out a first draft. I need to find some way to speed up the process. Because the first draft is only the beginning.

Well shit.

I did NOT finish the novel. I did NOT find a way to speed up the process. In fact, I became mired deeply in the realization that this part of it is Slow Going. But it’s a good one to put back on the list.

Also, I want to work on my patience, especially when it comes to my husband and my daughter. I want to work on exercising more regularly, because it greatly improves my mental health. I want to work on eating better. I want to read more.

Oh look, I left on some of the questions that I refused to answer last year! Just so we can give them a smug glance and move on!

  • Did anyone close to you give birth?
  • Did anyone close to you die?
  • What countries did you visit?

Same as last every year: Not really a big year for travel.

This year, I visited five states besides my own: California, Florida, New York, Virginia, and my home state out west.

I can’t really imagine the answers changing in a big way anytime soon. I mean, I have some trips coming up… but nothing out of the country until 2019.

  • What would you like to have in 2018 that you lacked in 2017?

What I said last year:

Better ability to prioritize my time. A fully drafted novel. Making my time with Carla richer, somehow, rather than making a bunch of slipshod and ultimately frustrating attempts at “activities.”

Yes, let’s go with the first two once again for 2018. I think I succeeded, a lot, with the third. Carla and I spent a lot more time together in 2017 than we ever have before, and much of it was really  GREAT. We do a lot of activities – games and art projects and baking projects and walks and bike rides – together, we go to museums and playgrounds, we snuggle together, we read together. If only I could get the PATIENCE thing down, I think it would be about perfect.

Also. Deep breath. Listen, I have tried really hard over the past few years to be okay with my body. It is what it is. For the most part, I have been okay with it. But with the ever compounding effects of aging coupled with some recent weight gain, I now find myself in a not-so-great place with regards to my physical appearance. So I would like to find a way to balance the work I need to do to achieve (a semblance of) what I WANT against the sometimes-impossible-to-achieve desire to just be Zen about the state of my physical being and accept it for what it is.

  • What dates from 2017 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?

This is kind of cheating, because it just happened, but December 29 because that’s when I learned that Sue Grafton passed away. She is an author whose work I have read for decades. And I admire her writing deeply, and love her primary character and her body of work. So I was really saddened when I found out she’d died.

  • What was your biggest achievement of the year?

Applying and being accepted to the writers’ conference.

  • What was your biggest failure?

Once again, what I said last year applies:

Not getting enough words on the page each day! I can trot out a 7,000-word blog post of a morning, but I seem to spend hours and hours coming up with a measly 200 for my manuscript! What gives? If I can do it elsewhere, why can’t I blather and drivel my way through a first draft?

Other failures abound!

As I mentioned before, attending the writing conference was hugely valuable… but I let it intimidate me. And that was a huge failure. Instead of digging in and doing the work, I shrank away from it and didn’t write for… many weeks. Once I got back into it, I think my writing has been stronger and more purposeful. But I am ashamed of myself for being so naïve about the process and then letting the revelation that This Isn’t Easy throw me for such a loop.

As if THAT wasn’t enough of a failure… I even blogged less than I did in 2016. So I don’t really know what’s going on. I am kicking the writing into HIGH GEAR in 2018, that’s for damn sure.

  • Did you suffer illness or injury?

In early September, I caught a cold. And it stuck around through all of September and then morphed into an atypical pneumonia in October. I finally kicked it in early November, but man. Being tired and unable to exercise for nearly two months was ROUGH. So, nothing serious (thank goodness) but it was annoying enough to be really memorable.

  • What was the best thing you bought?

I have no idea. My husband and I got each other a new mattress for Christmas, but the jury is still out on whether it’s better than our old mattress. I got a new coat that I like, and a new hat and scarf that I think are adorable.

  • Whose behavior merited celebration?

Every year I think it’s the same, so maybe this question should go on the reject list:

This goes 100% to my husband. He is a rockstar. I can’t even express all the ways he’s shown up this year without drowning my keyboard in tears, so let’s move on. 

  • Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?

As I said last year:

I mean do you really have to ask, non-sentient Survey created years ago with no knowledge of our current times? I think I’m going to cross this one out because it makes me sad and bewildered and fearful and shaky.

  • Where did most of your money go?
  • What did you get really, really, really excited about?

The past couple of years, my answer has been about Carla and the holidays. And it just keeps getting better and better! She gets SO excited about everything! But she is also getting old enough to really think about the holidays and look forward to them. She was interested in Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, and we went to Temple together. She was excited about Hanukkah and even lit the menorah all by herself (with close parental supervision, of course). She was excited about Christmas and had a blast picking out presents for her family and wrapping them herself, making Christmas cookies and chocolates, decorating the tree, and everything before, after, and in between. So much fun!

I also got really excited about the writing conference. It was a huge step outside my comfort zone, and I’m really glad I did it.

  • What song(s) will always remind you of 2017?

Carla has become OBSESSED with Taylor Swift. We listen to 1989 all the time in the car and she can sing most of the songs word for word. Her favorite is “Wildest Dreams.” I also think of “Despacito” when I think of this year, because it was on the radio a lot and because Carla really enjoyed it. There are others that I am not remembering because I am tired.

  • Compared to this time last year, are you:
  1. a) happier or sadder?
  2. b) thinner or fatter?
  3. c) richer or poorer?

This is a question I don’t care to answer anymore, I think. Are these really the benchmarks by which I want to measure the year? No, no I don’t think so. IRRITATED SCOWLING.

  • What do you wish you’d done more of?

Writing. (Always.) Reading. Prioritizing my time better. Exercising.

  • What do you wish you’d done less of?

Yelling. Looking at my phone. Looking at headlines and freaking out. Stressing about things I have no control over.

  • How did you spend Christmas?

Here at home, with my husband and Carla, and my parents. It was lovely and fun. We had snow. We had delicious food – my dad made a roast, my mom made a pie. We made chocolates – including three batches of caramel (two of which became caramel sauce rather than candies – very happy mistakes indeed). We played lots of games. We drank lots of wine. We watched lots of movies (Elf still makes me cry. Which makes me feel stupid. But man, there’s just something so TOUCHING about all those people singing Christmas carols together and believing in Santa!) It was relaxing and warm and delightful.

  • Did you fall in love in 2017?

Ugh. REJECT. Every year this one makes me gag a little. Let’s just say for the foreseeable future it will always be my husband, my daughter, or both of them.

  • What was your favorite (new) TV program?

Oh, how I love television!!! Mindhunter was good. So was Ozark. I enjoyed The Fall, even though it wasn’t my husband’s favorite. Big Little Lies was amazing and I wish I could watch it again for the first time. Dark was pretty excellent. Major Crimes is in its last season, and I am sad about that, because I have loved the cast and the format since the early days of The Closer. I also loved the latest seasons of The Americans, Fargo, Game of Thrones, The Great British Baking Competition, Shark Tank, Black-ish, Fresh Off the Boat, The Middle, Brooklyn Nine-Nine, Master of None and Catastrophe. God, I love TV.

  • Do you hate anyone now that you didn’t hate this time last year?

I can’t even. This question has got to go.

  • What was the best book you read?

Last November I fell into a Sue Grafton wormhole and started reading my way through her Kinsey Millhone series (again). In February – Q Is for Quarry, to be exact – I grew weary of the project. But after reading her newest (and final) book Y Is for Yesterday this past October, I had a renewed desire to finish. So I have V and W left to go. And now I own the entire series.

Okay, that entire paragraph had nothing to do with the question. The best book, I think, is a three-way tie between Celeste Ng’s Little Fires Everywhere, Joe Ide’s IQ, and Justin Cronin’s The Passage. All were excellent, and I still think about them. They were high points in an otherwise dreary year, reading-wise. I don’t know what my problem is. It’s not lack of good reading material, that’s for sure. I just have been in a Reading Funk. Oh well. It happens, I guess.

  • What did you want and get?

For Christmas: Some survivalist tools. A new painting by my mother. A white Christmas. A new mattress. A cozy sweater that I kept seeing on every gift guide ever. Books: a new one I’ve been eyeing and another I haven’t. Cozy socks.

In general: Acceptance to the writing conference. Lots of really great quality time with my husband and Carla. More confidence as a (part-time) stay-at-home-mom.

  • What did you want and not get?

Second verse, same as the first:

A finished first draft of my manuscript because I am SLOW.

  • What was your favorite film of this year?

I don’t watch many movies, so I am squinting really hard trying to remember ANY besides Moana. Which was, hands down, the best movie I’ve seen all year. So. Good. Carla and I both cried in the theater when watching it for the first time, and again when we watched it at home many weeks later.

  • What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
  • What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?

Same as every year (don’t I ever PROGRESS as a person?!?!):

Being able to just LET GO and not freak out about EVERYTHING.

  • How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2017?

Um, trying to stay on trend enough to not feel like a Total Loser around the other moms at dropoff without giving in to Being Trendy or spending a million bucks? Does that count as a personal fashion concept?

  • What kept you sane?

My husband. Exercise. Mom friends. Being able to write every day most days.

  • Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?

I have big writer crushes on Louise Erdrich, Celeste Ng, and the late Sue Grafton.

  • What political issue stirred you the most?
  • Who did you miss?

I have had a lot of serious loneliness for some of my good friends who don’t live in my state. My best friend from forever, who lives two time zones away. My dear friend from medical school (not that she or I actually went to medical school; our husbands did) who has two beautiful daughters and a wonderful husband and who is, herself, fantastic. I wish they lived nearer. Some college friends I miss.

  • Who was the best new person you met?

I have made a few new friends through Carla! Some are still in the very early stages, others are moving right along. I haven’t found a Best Friend yet, but that’s okay.

  • Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2017.

Same as last year because I find myself amusing:

Write it down, don’t write it right, for the love of all that is holey.

  • Quote a song lyric that sums up your year.

(I don’t know if the following makes sense as a lyric or as the answer to this question, but it’s in my head, so I’m going with it.)

Will you remember me / standing in a nice dress / staring at the sunset babe.

Red lips and rosy cheeks / Say you’ll see me again / even if it’s just in your

Wildest dreams.

Happy New Year, Internet! I hope 2018 goes a hell of a lot better than 2017!