Brushed & Flossed

New Year? New You! – Sunday, 6 January, 2019

Well, last year I crashed and burned on the 100th day of my 365 days of writing. There was major end of the school year stress. There was the excitement of getting it together for a new job opportunity. There was whatever there was. I even began the 100th entry, I just never posted it. Soooooo… in honor of the need for humanity, and the queen of second chances, here I am with a new challenge. I’m going to set a goal to write a weekly blog. The daily thing is just too much with everything else going on. I’m okay with that. I have to be.

It is actually a combination of Darling Son and Friend R who have inspired this entry.

Darling Son got me started with talking about the silliness of people making New Year’s resolutions they don’t intend to keep. I tried to get all cheerful about it and explained how good intentions and goal setting aren’t bad things. He is already jaded at a wise old age of thirteen. His adolescence sees him as ready to judge others’ failures without taking into consideration extenuating circumstances and the just plain craziness that makes for modern life. Example: We are in the midst of finding a new gym as the fees for our current gym are outlandish for the services provided. I loved belonging to our local YMCA. There’s a pool, some yoga classes, a weight/cardio room, a just-getting-started weight room, and discounts on youth recreation programs. Slowly the hours have dwindled down to nearly nothing; the pool is no longer year round (in Arizona!?), and Darling Son has outgrown the recreation opportunities that fit his interests. So, we are spending WAY more money than is sensible for the services we use.

Challenge? Well, Darling Son does not want to go looking for a new gym in January because that is when all the posers are looking for a new gym. I delayed in canceling our Y membership, so we are good to go until the beginning of February, but all the excitement and ganga deals for new gym memberships are happening right now! I’m going to have to just get jiggy with it and maybe use this month to explore the specials. Thing is, I HATE the high pressure sales deals. The use of the word “hate” is a whole other blog entry. So I will just state for the record that I do not use that word lightly.

In addition to the whole gym membership thing, I have the added incentive to evaluate New Year? New You! because my Friend R was talking about getting a new planner for her life organization. We met up on New Year’s Eve afternoon and were talking about how goal setting and life organization is easier with an interactive calendar or planner. I used to keep a planner! Those were the days when I was more organized, or at least when I held delusions of organization. I have spiraled into quite a disarray of organization so her words of wisdom have inspired me to give that a try again. When I went online to look for a new agenda to note my plans and responsibilities I discovered the new trend of “bullet journaling.” Let’s be honest here, part of me wants to decry the “next new thing” as one more task designed to make people like me (disorganized and overcommitted) to feel inferior to people with “perfect” little systems of organization and clean bathrooms. The other part of me wants to la-di-dah something that is a been-there-done-that-called-it-something-different-then. I started keeping calendars, agendas, planners, etc. back in my middle school days…not teaching middle school, but living it. I noted, I color coded, I doodled, I highlighted. Yeah. I’ve survived (and sometimes thrived) multiple incarnations of keeping a portable date book.

Hey, does anyone else remember those little calendars we picked up at the Hallmark store and carried in our purse to note all our important dates? Wow! I just remembered that! I don’t remember when I started using those, fifth or sixth grade? By seventh grade I know that I had already committed to something that was a bit heftier in the way it allowed me to keep track of deadlines, important dates, and spend time to save time. I had a little tan-colored, faux-suede agenda with a snap to keep it closed in my purse. Oh, and a little brown etching-like illustration of a wildcat kitten. Awwwwwwww.