2005

Since New Year’s is my most cherished holiday, I have an inclination to make a lot of resolutions. I tell myself each year that this year will be the year I turn the corner on many things. This year I will learn to ride a bike. This year I will drive completely on my own. This year I will learn to take things less seriously. Less personally. Less emotionally. And, of course, most of it never happens.

I’ve come to believe that things happen one of two ways: out of severe necessity or because it’s time. In 2004, I quit drinking Diet Coke because I got pregnant and I knew that for a person who drank 8 to 10 cans a day, switching to 1 a day wasn’t a realistic option. I started drinking a ton more water, eating healthier, trying to keep my yoga to a regular schedule, stress less, and give up the need to lose weight. All for the same reason. The baby to come.

I moved leaps and bounds in driving in that I’ve become a lot more comfortable and can hold animated conversations while I’m driving. This didn’t come out of hours of practice like one would think. It actually seems the less I drove, the more I became okay with it. I still have a huge way to go on that but somehow the time must have come for me to relax a bit because I did without a personal effort or vow to do so.

As for reading more, learning more, being happier and calmer. Those came and went with the hormones in my body. To be fully honest, I can’t even remember the first four months before I was pregnant. I can’t remember how it felt not to feel so big and clumsy. Not to have to pee every five seconds. Regardless, most of this year felt like it wasn’t in my control and I learned quickly to keep up with the necessary and let go of the trivial.

Which brings me to 2005. I am now wise enough to admit that I cannot make a single resolution that I am guaranteed to keep in 2005. I cross my fingers and toes that the baby will come close to on time and the labor will be as bearable as possible and, most importantly, the baby will be healthy and happy. If all those things happen, I am willing to consider 2005 a good year.

Most of my wishes for this coming year involve others. I wish for Jake’s business to prosper. I want us to have a happy balance and a healthy approach to building our family. I hope the baby has an uneventful, happy, colic-free year. We will be starting the year with a lot of visitors which means that we’ll be surrounded by family more than we’ve been in the last ten years. I hope that it strengthens our bonds and starts us off in a good track.

I know that I won’t be able to control most of what goes on this year (and probably all the others after this one). I hope I learn to relinquish the need to control quickly and learn to live my new life as wonderfully as possible. I make no resolutions this year, except for one which I think is necessary:

I will learn to go with the flow.

May 2005 bring all of you prosperity, luck, health, and ample joy. Thank you for stopping by.