Aspirational Word for 2018 in Everyday Ramblings

A paper snowflake Miss E. made a few years back and sent in her Christmas card and a quilt that was a gift about the same time from a former coworker (a lovely surprise).

We went from ice (it was a bit dicey walking over the freeway bridge on Wednesday night) to torrential rain and a flood watch.

Along with this idea of 18 for 18, I am hearing folks ask about one word that would define one’s aspirations for the year ahead.

I am torn, between the word Back-care (because really everything is so much more difficult, as many of you know all too well, if your back hurts) and Finish!

It would be so cool if I could finish a bunch of things I started and never got back to…books for instance, a wonderful book on bees, one on the power grid, one on the fundamental economic theories behind the Koch Brothers amazingly successful political (and self-enrichment) agenda.

I have so many projects around the homestead too. Everything has been so outwardly focused the last couple of years.

The bunion on my right foot, the bone is ever so subtly shifting and I am going to need to work on that and getting a bit more comfortable footwear. (I have a big rubber band around my big toes as I type this.)

Last night in in the torrential rain after work I went to the gym for the first time in maybe three months. Eek. Straight off I went to the leg press (I was warmed up from walking) and all la de da set the weight at 135 lbs. because that is what I was pressing last time I was there.

Ha! Just Ha! I could not even move the plate at that weight.

Even with all the walking and yoga I do.

So this is a cautionary tale. No wonder my back hurts again. I have lost all the strength gains (well not all but it feels that way) from when I was taking this seriously and going to physical therapy.

It was a very Duh! moment for me. Especially as we age, if you do not use it, oh baby do you lose it.

So back-care. Yes! Not so much aspirational as necessary.

But the point of having a word for the year ahead is to have something to gnaw on and creatively approach. So that will be Finished!

Not Finish, which is more of a directive that would be easy to get all rebellious against, but Finished, the feeling state of accomplishment, seeing things through.

I still have marketing and maintenance to do for my yoga teaching business but for the first time ever I am in the black at the end of the year after 4 1/2years of teaching. My students are wonderful and I feel blessed to have them in my life.

Miss E. (maker of the above paper snowflake) is going to be graduating from high school this coming spring. She is deferred for Columbia, (her first choice of college) and may still get in but has a full scholarship to St. John’s as a fallback.

The cats are healthy and quite rowdy. Diego was a crazy man last night running around bapping cough drops out of a small bowl and hiding them all over the place. Carlo thinks that pestering me with affection gets him what he wants so I am often gently picking cats off of, well, everything and putting them on the floor.

With 2 ½ years until retirement this is my somewhat coast year. This time next year I’ll be preparing for all my Medicare paperwork and choosing my supplemental plan and hoping like heck that Paul Ryan gets knocked out of his seat as Speaker of the House.

Speaking of Finished! :)

Last updated December 29, 2017