Wednesday, December 30, 2015

Obligatory Year End Blog Post OR Eddie Vedder is Swoonable

I'm trying to find a nice way to tell this year goodbye without sounding like I'm too excited for the arrival of 2016.  Really, it's not like I despised 2015, I didn't/don't.  I'm not even sick of it.  I actually kind of liked 2015.  But the calendar is the way it is, and 2016 is going to be here no matter how fond I was/am of 2015.  And 2015 will be no more.  I'm fine with this.

So back to my struggle.

This week between Christmas and New Year's when you have no idea what day it is, the date is irrelevant, and you probably ate too many peanut butter sandwiches while you were attempting to figure it out.  This last bit is especially troubling if you, like me, just recently found out about your new life stipulation that wheat and dairy be eradicated from your diet.

But it just drags on.  This never ending week of posts from friends and coaches and colleagues titled things like "Closure and Cloister, Ten Lessons You Should Have Learned in 2015;" "Call to Action: What 2016 Needs From Your Digestive Tract;" "The Coming Trend of Eyelash Removal and the Brave Pioneers Behind It;" and my personal favorite "Failing at Flailing: Your Inner Fangirl's Loss of Nerdido." <-- (a nerd's libido, obvs).

I'm just ready for it to be done.  Goodbye, 2015, it's been a real slice.  But let's get on with it, shall we?  

What is this last week of lamenting all about?  Think about it?  We do it every year.  Okay, not we You.  You do it every year.  I don't do it every year because, frankly, I'm kind of a jerk and half the time I don't notice that the year is on its way out until is over and done and it's calling me asking if nothing we shared ever meant anything to me.  I hang up and roll my eyes at the obvious wrong number and feel bad for the poor bastard who has to deal with that clingy handful.  When it's over, it's over, am I right?

*clears throat*

It's statements like the above that are the reason people cry when I talk, isn't it?

Moving on.

Why all of the emotional attachment to a numerical based system of measuring the passage of time?  Every January is the same:  "This year is MY year!" and it ends the same:  "Screw last year!  Last year was the worst!"

Hate to break it to you, but you're kind of being a little bit slutty with your years.  Maybe if you treated them the way you want to be treated, you wouldn't feel so devastated at the end when it dawns on you that it's just a number and is not, in fact, an all powerful Oz promising to make your dreams come true.

I spend this week rolling my eyes a bit and trying to figure out how I can cram one more gluten free cookie baking session into my daily life without drawing a lot of attention to myself.  And also, planning a birthday (he's turning five this year. Star Wars the theme).

Stop putting so much pressure on the year to do and be great things for you.  Do and be great things for yourself.  That's right, I said it.  Do it FOR YOU.  The year doesn't matter, it's a way to mark off the passage of time and remind you to pay your bills so that you don't freeze to death in February when winter finally shows up (it's coming. it always does).

Say goodbye to 2015 with a blown kiss and a jazzy wave.  Have your party if you must, but curb your hatred.  If 2015 let you down, that's on you.  Maybe your New Year's Resolution should be to place less responsibility for your emotional happiness on a Stardate, yeah?  Maybe, just maybe, this year *rolls eyes so hard it hurts* you take control of your life and make it yours.

Yeah.  I like the feel of that.  This life is mine.  The dates don't matter except to mark the beginning and end on my gravestone of where I started and stopped.  

But the in between is mine.