Twenty-Twenty-Two

What punishments of God are not gifts?

From my vantage point on the couch I can see the clouds moving swiftly outside – “scudding” I would say, if I were writing a novel. A cold front is on the way, welcome to all of us as it has been a clammy, stifling 80-something degrees along the Gulf Coast this whole Christmas season. The light is odd, orangey – if we were in the Midwest I would call it Tornado Weather (which incidentally is the name of a novel published by my college classmate – I loved it, recommend you spend your Christmas gift card money on a copy). Down here the weird light and whizzing cumulus are not a harbinger of violent weather – just a little oppressive and mildly alarming. Tomorrow will be our first freeze of the season.

It is Saturday, January 1, 2022. Last night we let Craiggy boy stay up, although he and I went to my bed (with all the lights on) around 9 to hang out until midnight. By design, he fell asleep in minutes and I followed shortly thereafter, but the Prof got us both up a few minutes before midnight EST to watch the ball drop in Times Square. We tried to wake Craig up for the countdown, because we had promised we would, but he never fully roused. So this morning when he got out of bed he pouted for an hour because he woke up convinced we’d put him to bed before midnight, and then was too committed to the pouting to give up even though I showed him photographic evidence that he’d been with us at the ball drop. He will be eight in a couple of weeks. For Christmas this year he was given some LED lights on a strip, like his big brothers got – it’s all the rage for the teens and tweens to decorate rooms with LEDs these days. When Jack was putting his up he had me get a ladder and help him design and hang/stick them, but Craig apparently forged ahead himself. He did not remove the back on the adhesive strip, but instead Scotch-taped them up in a funny little circle around his twin bed, and I don’t know but that is the perfect representation of those two boys and their approach to life. (Liam’s are still in the roll on his desk – he’s too busy playing video games and that is also pretty representative! Ha!)

A friend posted the interview on grief from a couple years ago between Anderson Cooper and Stephen Colbert. I’d heard it before but I was struck anew by the Colbert paraphrase of Tolkien – “what punishments of God are not gifts?” And it sounds maudlin and angsty but I think that’s my mantra for 2022. 2020 was so frightening, 2021 such a slog because of the pandemic. (I vividly remember in April or May of 2020 hearing an epidemiologist expert gently saying that pandemics always last for years, and me not wanting to believe it and then knowing it was true but allowing myself to pretend it wasn’t true for a while. Let the blow fall by degrees). The pandemic and the American culture wars over it (and every damn thing) aren’t going to end in 2022. There are more punishments in store. There are more gifts in store. We are all awash in grief and gratitude. When among the graves of thy fellows, walk with circumspection; thine own is open at thy feet.

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Now *brisk clap* – I have set my goals for 2022. I think I’ve figured out why I like goal setting – it’s the same reason I like my trainer. I enjoy working out, but I usually feel guilty when I do it because I ‘should be’ doing something else – cooking, shopping, laundry, work. It’s an indulgence to go to the gym for an hour and a half – but when I pay somebody to hold me accountable, then it becomes acceptable to shirk my other duties and go. I think that’s why I like goals – these are all things I want to do and enjoy, not things I feel grudging obligation to do. I’m just giving myself permission to prioritize them, I guess? Because my internal Eldest Daughter needs permission. Anyhoo, I put together a lot this year – scribbled them in pencil in a little notebook I have, just brainstorming ways I could make myself happier in 2022. So, in 2022, I give myself permission to prioritize:

1. Fitness – I work out 5-6 days a week and I want to keep that up. Also, now that my panic attacks are subsiding, I want to start running again. My “running” has always been a slow jog, but I used to be able to slow jog a half marathon and now I can barely run for five minutes. So I want to baby step my way back to longer runs again, and here is how:
   • First Quarter: run a mile without stopping
   • Second Quarter: speed up that mile to be under 12 minutes
   • Third Quarter: run two miles without stopping
   • Fourth Quarter: run three miles without stopping
2. Parenting –
   • weekly game nights with the kids, which we had previously instituted but fell by the wayside
   • take a week’s vacation with the kids and be totally off the whole time
   • keep up going to their events an after school stuff, covid-permitting
   • connect again with Liam on the puberty talks, which I had been doing but stopped at some point
3. Art/Creativity –
   • finish up the screenplay I’ve been working on with friends
   • dust off the novel again
   • keep painting with watercolors – I am not skilled but it is so fun
   • pull out the embroidery more often
   • sing in a choir again – if mine continues its covid-hiatus, find another
4. Spiritual Wellness –
   • regular church attendance again, covid-permitting
   • daily divine hours prayers
   • read tarot every Monday
   • make time for art and poems – I am still noodling how to turn this very vague ambition into a regular reality, but so often sitting with a poem or really looking at gorgeous art is so fulfilling, and I instead often go for iPhone garbage instead
   • meditate daily
5. Cooking Goals –
   • we received numerous cookbooks from the Prof’s Grandmother and they are in our storage unit pending the built-ins project. Once we have shelves, I want to go through them and pick some stuff I’ve never made before.
   • more protein, fewer starches – and more greens of all kinds. Chard, collards, kale, mustard greens, turnip greens – gimme all the greens.
6. Travel –
   • It’s hard to make a travel goal in the Covid era, but I would enjoy hitting a national park this year
   • more camping. I love camping, and I haven’t gone regularly in years because the stress and anxiety of folding the preparations and cleanup into my billable year made it a misery. Trying to shed those inclinations now that I no longer bill time, and I’d like to get back into camping.
7. Reading
   • I’ve read probably forty books this year and just about every single one of them is a murder mystery. I love murder mysteries, but I also love other types of books and I’d like to expand into other genres again.