As The Year Winds Down

Traditionally, I use the last week of the year to clean up loose ends, tidy up, look back, and plan for a fresh start in the coming year. Years ago, when I was still working and many people were out of the office during this week, a reduction in the number of meetings and a quiet office provided a perfect environment in which to do so. In more recent years, I’ve sequestered myself in my woman cave for hours every day with my heater humming and soft music playing.

This year is different again, with Laurinda and Makiya in residence, and my woman cave in use for something else, so I’m stealing pockets of time and spending more time that usual in my head sorting things out. It doesn’t necessarily make for good company all the time, but I’m finding balance between solitude-that-doesn’t-look-like-solitude and family time (at least, that’s my story).

It’s bitterly cold this week, and a perfect week to stay inside. That said, I will have to venture out at some point for an important errand. I’m watching the weather and weighing options. Meanwhile, it’s daytime pajama week and I make no apologies for it.

I’m sick of turkey and craving something crisp and green. We don’t, as a rule, eat salad out of season but I’m considering making an exception. But, I probably won’t. Any greens now would be an unreasonable facsimile of what will available locally in a few short months. Meanwhile, I’m going to mangle the turkey carcass and make soup stock today. One step closer to seeing the end of the bird for good.

I’ve chosen a word for 2022. Something. It came to me here in a blog post when I said, feeling overwhelmed about pretty much everything: “I can’t fix everything, but I can do something for someone”. So something it is. A reminder that in the wake of so many big and troubling things, doing a small something with resources available can be enough. Will you choose a word? Have you?

We had such hopes for 2021, didn’t we? Are we too battle weary to pick them up and carry them forward into 2022? In a short conversation with my granddaughter yesterday she predicted that by mid-2022 we’d return to a semblance of normal, but that true normal (whatever new thing that turns out to be) wouldn’t show up until 2023. I think her prediction may turn out to be fairly accurate. Are we up for another year of upside down? What choice do we have?

We talk about the unprecedented-ness of 2020 and 2021 but the reality is that global societal upheaval is nothing new. We’ve been here before. The cloak it wears this time seems more sinister, the pace of change, faster, and the trajectory more apparent, but behind the curtain there’s nothing we as a people haven’t already encountered.

So, as the hours tick away and the year winds down, my attention returns to taking care of loose ends, tidying up, and shoring up my foundation to be ready for whatever 2022 has in store. These, under the umbrella of hope, faith, and love: three small and simple concepts that I will spend the rest of my life unpacking.