It is a new year for all of us who follow the Gregorian calendar, and that's virtually the entire world. Even the people who use different calendar systems - year 5785 for Hebrews, 1446-47 for Moslems - will still do secular business and make appointments in this year of 2025. How will we observe it and live through it?
Some of us will spend a bit of time in reflection and create a list of intentions (resolutions) for the year ahead, spread out before us as one poet observed like a pathway covered with new-fallen snow awaiting our footprints. It doesn't have to be an onerous exercise and it should never become a bludgeon of guilt for perceived "failures" of achievement. Here's some of my possibilities:
First off, these are my resolutionsand you should feel no obligation to adopt any of them. In a recent article on essays (of all things for an English teacher to read) a writer noted that Montaigne's original term, as we all learned in school, was an "essaie" a try, an enquiry, a self-questioning but that nowadays the essay, be it a journalistic investigation or a reflective article, had become a demonstration of learning, a showing off such as … Well such as this paragraph itself. But before I get myself tied up in some ontological knot, let me pontificate on my prospective pretensions for the coming year.
1. I will unsubscribe. Whenever you or I downloaded an article or booked a reservation or bought something online we were probably encouraged, even required, to click on the box agreeing to receive future bits of information about the product or service. Hah! We added ourselves to a list of targets for future ads by that company. That's why we now have a huge (and every day getting huger) list of emails to wade through. I am going to take a minute and unsubscribe from many of those sites. And if I'm not sure how to do that, I will ask. Fortunately I have children and grandchildren with far greater computer competencies than I have. You have too - children etc. that is. Use them.
For instance, I was sure that I had unsubscribed from Amazon's Audibile site after one purchase, but on checking my visa bills over the next few months I saw that I had more "credits" for more books which I was paying for and no, the company wasn't going to refund anything but here were lists of all these wonderful audiobooks I could download. I finally unsubscribed after using up those credits. I don't know when/where I'll listen to all those recorded volumes, but they're mine and I've got 'em and I won't be paying for any more.
2. I will subscribe. There may be a few sites you actually trust and want to support. I get Michael Moore's and Margaret Atwood's substack postings for free. They will ask you to become a paid subscriber but with no pressure. Ms Atwood says that any monies she gets will go to her Pelee Island bird sanctuary work, and Michael Moore provides access to some of his Osar-winning documentaries to paid subscibers. I'll keep those subscriptions and continue to donate.
Other online journals or substacks which I trust include Tyee with its predominantly BC and Alberta focus but which also has articles of interest to all Canadians by powerful investigative (are there any other kind?) journalists. From the US, I receive material from the Washington Post and Atlantic Monthly, especially because they carry pieces by Brett Stephens, David Frum, David Brooks and some other fine writers.
3. I will read something. Besides those audiobooks I still have some hard copy texts and early and late are good times for them. I know that first thing in the morning is not a good time to immerse myself in digital data. The internet is addictive, but I think that those first few hours with a cup of tea or coffee are better spent looking at text or even digging in the garden. I do like to read last thing at night and of course I have a partner who always cuddles over and says "Read to me, read to me". And so I have the last hour of the day spent reading aloud. It's a good time for both of us.
4. I will write something (besides this blog). Some of you keep a journal and even for those of us who just record what we did that day or make notes on what to buy for the cupboards that are getting bare, it's still a source of writing. At the end of the year, I always flip back through that notebook to see if there's any jotting that I had that may be expanded into a poem perhaps, or a letter that I should have written and it's not too late to get off. I still have some notebooks from the year 2003 when we were in China that need to be mined for some of the ideas that I set down there.
If you really are not a writer, then you can at least write a letter to someone. I'm going to write more pen-on-paper letters to politicians. I'll write another letter like that to my grandchildren. If I print it (because my cursive handwriting is fading fast and little people don't read it anyway) and add pictures they really will treasure it or at least their parents will, and later they will keep them. We can tell grandchildren, especially as they reach the preteens what life has been like for us, what we remember of our younger days, what we hope they will find in the world.
5. I will watch something. The Bob Dylan A Complete Unknown was one that we recently watched, and there are at least four other bio films on Bob Dylan that I am now interested in calling up. When I watch the Golden Globe awards and the Oscars, I make a note of the films that I really want to see in the coming year and there are always two or three at least that attract my attention. Those are the ones that we could spend our scarce entertainment timebudget on. You see how easy it is to slip into the role of teacher or person with sage advice who wants to tell you how to live your life. This really is my list and under this heading of "watch something" I do have a number of shows and series that I intend to see.
6. I will get healthy. I really am going to get healthy or get healthier. Now in my 84th year I still go or get dragged to exercise classes twice a week and do a swimming pool another two times a week and a walk in the park on the weekend. An app on my phone records the number of steps that I take each day and which I am too embarrassed to even report here. I know I want to increase it, and so walking is probably the simplest way to maintain my good health. It's also the way to lose some weight and my goal is to shed 10 pounds this year to move from the 195 to the 185 pound range.
As well as the exercise or the output of energy I know that the input is also significant in my health. Some 24 years ago I stopped putting cigarette smoke into my body and now I think I need to limit the amount of chocolate and alcohol, both of them high caloric items that I ingest. I like to joke that single malt scotch is God's gift or Scotland's gift to the rest of the world, but the truth is I really don't need the 5 o'clock drink every day.
After my physical health, I know that my emotional or mental health is also important and in that area I want to continue to support the causes that I feel are making the world a better place for me certainly and for the people I care about. The best advice I ever got in that area was to serve those things that serve me. 'Nough said.
My health also depends on doing nothing at times. Spending time alone is different than being lonely, and I believe it is different than the quiet time in meditation or introspection to prepare for moving out into the world. I'll see.
That's quite a list and I'm still working on the pronunciation of sxʷeŋxʷəŋ təŋəxʷ my Lekwungen name for James Bay library /s-hweng hw-ung tongue-oo-hw/ I'm getting there with the help of Dave Elliot and Lorisa.
What are you up to?