There is a Rilke quote that I’ve long liked, “Now let us welcome the new year, full of things that have never been.” It captures that wonderful blank slatedness of the new year, the limitless tomorrow, fresh with no mistakes in it (my eldest and I have been watching the classic late 80’s Anne of Green Gables movies over break, so that last phrase is particularly appropriate right now). As a writer, blank pages are close to my heart. As a human, fresh starts are vital. It’s no wonder that the world celebrates as the calendar rolls. On the list of common human experience, New Years, and the need for it, comes in close to the top.
Some years I’ve made resolutions. Big resolutions. Small resolutions. Public resolutions because accountability is key. Secret resolutions because sometimes a resolution is bigger and more daunting, more a heart’s wish than words. The thing about change, though, big change, is that it only happens when there’s something deep inside of us that opens for it. It’s a visceral internal shift, a raw, hollowed out rock bottom, or a quiet click of acceptance, but there’s no forcing it. When it really matters, it takes more than will power and more than 21 days of routine. If we want to floss daily, a New Years resolution is perfect for that, but I’ve found personally that my internal epiphanies rarely align with the Gregorian calendar.
In 2015, I came as close to a lifestyle shift as I ever have. I ate more food with fewer, or even better, single, ingredients. I have eaten more squash in more forms than I ever have before, and my go-to restaurant order has become grilled chicken or salmon salad. I have no regrets when I don’t eat the office doughnuts or the soccer practice cupcakes or the buttery garlic breadsticks. Actually, that’s a lie about the breadsticks. But true about the others. And I feel better for the squash and the zoodles and the almond butter and coconut milk. I recognize and appreciate that I don’t automatically feel the need to shove a child strategically in front of me in photos, or crop out half my arm. I’m more comfortable in my own skin than I have been in years and it feels good. And yet…
Just as they say that money doesn’t buy happiness (though, let’s all agree that that’s a theory each of us should have a chance to test), neither does being able to slip on your pre-marriage, pre-baby jeans buy sudden Zen. It turns out, if you eat a lot more squash, you’ll be able to flip out about your spring schedule, or your post-Christmas finances or your husband suggesting buying Star Wars tickets in the handicap row (where we’d look like jerks the entire time?!), while wearing jeans from 2004 (flares are back!)… but just as stubbornly, irrationally and temperamentally as before.
The new year will be full of things that have never been… and full of things that have been time and time and time again. I’m finally going to go to that barre class that I bought that Groupon for five months ago. I can walk there, so there’s really no excuse. And I’m going to take nine 8-year-old Brownies to an overnight at the Downtown Aquarium, enjoying some of my favorite other-mothers while we sleep with the sharks and stingrays. There are vacations to plan and projects to tackle. New year electricity is crackling like a siren’s call. And yet… in this brand new year, my mind will go slightly numb while my ears buzz with the daily non-stop chatter of my youngest, and I’m going to get home and realize that, once again, everything we might have had for dinner is still frozen. I’m going to listen to my daughter read, painstaking word by word, the lessons of the Berenstein Bears, while I secretly let my mind wander back to that thing at work, and forward to the moment when I can collapse into a book of my own. And then I’ll suddenly realize that these were the days, my friend, as I let them slip by with ill-concealed impatience, and I’ll promise to do better, to be more present. And then I’ll forget.
This year, with that blank page waiting, I’m looking forward to the new year, but I don’t have any named resolutions. 2016 is beginning with the first above-freezing weather in a couple of weeks, and the Beck household has recovered from a round of post-Christmas stomach bug. The world does indeed seem fresh and new. There’s just something about New Years. This year I’d like to make more good decisions than bad. And remember to tell my husband that I appreciate him. And I’d really like to lose fewer arguments to the cat. Although anyone who has met the cat knows how unlikely that is.
Happy New Year, my friends. Breathe deep.