After two weeks of reflection, the author rethinks her resolutions
My Top Ten New Year’s Resolutions. Revised from January 1
10. Original: Wear more pink. My usual swirl of black and grey is wearing thin. Perhaps, on occasion, you’ve noticed a storm approaching as you walk down the streets of Pelham and curse yourself for not bringing an umbrella. Then, as fast as it appeared, it’s gone, and you wonder if you imagined it. That was me. In 2020, be on the lookout for a garden of fuchsia lipsticks and rosy scarfs, blinding you momentarily but leaving you feeling uplifted and spring-y.
10. Revised: Wear fewer sweatpants, black, grey, or otherwise. It’s not about the track pants so much as the sweatpants, my husband laments, as I smooth away a crease and re-tie the drawstring on my favourite pair.
9. Original: Make a vegan meal once per week. I’m not a vegan and have no ambition to become one, but I’d like to know what all the fuss is about. There were four shelves of vegan cookbooks at the last bookstore I visited, so something’s definitely up.
9. Revised: Order a Vegan meal at least once this year.
8. Original: Empty my orphan sock drawer. They’re practically like family, all these lonely soles, tragically separated from their siblings. I brought 14 of them with me over the last two moves. I need to just let them go. I think I’ll pile them on a Viking pyre, and let their burning remains float down the canal and into Lake Ontario.
8. Revised: Forget it. I’ve become too attached to them. I’m certain their sisters will show up sometime.
7. Original: Give up chocolate. What? You heard me. I’ve been able to justify my addiction based on the apparent antioxidants which are embodied in its delicious, creamy, soothing melt-in-my mouth cocoa-fix, although there are fewer in the milky kind, which is the one I like. Time to break up with chocolate, cold turkey, and live a healthier, thinner life.
7. Revised: Eat less chocolate. After all, it’s not called an addiction for nothing. But let’s be clear, I won’t tell you what the reduced amount of chocolate is that I’m allowing because then you’ll be all, “You mean you were eating more than that?” Looking for support here, not judgment.
6. Original: Treat my kids better. And by that I mean improve their survival skills for when they go to college by making them do more chores around the house. One day they’ll thank me for it.
6. Revised: It’ll take me more time explaining how to efficiently load the dishwasher so that it houses the maximum amount of dishes possible than it will for me to just load it myself. They’ll learn when/if they move out.
5. Original: Spend less time cleaning. Tough to clean less than I do, but this goal is attainable; see No. 6, above.
5. Revised: See No. 6, Revised, and again, don’t judge.
4. Original: Type more letters. This was actually the report card comment from a keyboarding teacher I knew, but that’s not my context here. Call me old-fashioned, but we seem to have lost the art of writing a letter and putting it in the mail. Thank-yous are at the top of the list. (By the way, thank you for reading this list. Your personalized note is in the mail.)
4. Revised: Friend me on Facebook and you’ll find a mass thank you. I really appreciate you.
3. Original: Learn those text acronyms so that I can understand what my kids are thumbing on their phones as I look over their shoulders. Example: MOS (mom over shoulder), GAL (get a life.)
3. Revised: On second thought, I don’t really want to know—TMI (too much information.) BMHITS (burying my head in the sand.)
2. Original: Take kick- boxing classes. My husband did this 20 years ago and claims he was the fittest he’d ever been. Time to up my fitness game.
2. Revised: Since we just moved, we have still have a lot of random boxes lying around. Let me flip it. Box-kicking it is.
1. Original: As usual, be a good friend. Stay in touch. Make time for the people I love.
1. Revised: No revision.
Happy Belated New Year. ♦
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