Tag Archives: 2023

End of 2023: Bookshelf of Hours

Happy end of the year! I hope you found 2023 fruitful and fun. It was an interesting year that left me optimistic for 2024.

I think I had a good year! It flew by. It was kind of a year of putting my head down and working hard on the tasks in front of me. Nothing wrong with that, I suppose! All work and no play doesn’t make me a dull boy. But also: there was play! Some days, I felt so so lucky. Lots of great adventures and some very fun hours. Lots to be found in the small spaces of the weeks and days. Lots of unexpected laughs! And little life-affirming conversations and interactions. My interior life was fulfilling and lovely.

Do you have goals for 2024? I haven’t really thought about resolutions this year. I think they come to me over the course of January. Some years I need a fresh start more than others. Like many, I wonder if a new routine can heal me. Probably?! Like everything, that remains to be seen.

I am excited to write more in 2024. Rereading some of my old work has inspired me to reach back into that corner of my brain. 2023 left me feeling stuck in one style of poem. I wrote this while looking at the ocean:

I shelved a version
and took out another:
the book of _____ 
on the shelf of _____.

I am looking forward to 2024 and feel good about it! Staying optimistic at this juncture. (Maybe, for once, I am looking forward more than I am looking back and reflecting.) I hope you have a nice new year! May 2024 be filled with good luck for all of us!

End of August 2023: Engulfing

Or: being engulfed? Back to routine and the days are winding up again like a ball of yarn…

I hate that fatigue can sometimes feel satisfying, like a mark of productivity (the body keeps the score?). Sometimes I measure my self-worth with that feeling. I never know how much to buy into that. I think it might be useful to some extent. Like stress. But on another level… it is deeply sad. And it is not chic.

Time and tasks have been swallowing me up. I kind of love it; it’s been almost like a surrender to the rip current of everything that demands my attention. But then again, how could I not hate it?? There is no time for anything. There is only time for that for which there is time. Coming up for a breath like… taking a quiet beat to myself while spreading almond butter on a piece of bread. Or something like that.