2021 in Review
Turning the Corner?
I have had a difficult year. I’m sure many of us have experienced challenges. I have only empathy for what *gestures broadly* must have changed in your daily lives.
I won’t discount how my personal narrative has taken extreme obstacles. It’s been hard. So fucking hard.
It starts with the surgery (my first ever), and I really don’t know how it ends.
A year is sometimes a tough length to look at. It involves only one cycle of the seasons; the tides of time that push and pull goals from grasp.
Still, this arbitrary marker becomes goal posts I can measure from, looking backwards into my life.
It’s never nearly as ideal as I hope for. I am pleasantly surprised by the heights. I am disappointed but not always surprised by my lows.
The circles of your life tend to come around again.
Even still.
I am joyful.
I am a better person than I was a year ago, even if I don’t feel much changed month to month
And it speaks to the system that keeps my life on track; I continue to be successful at things. Not all the things. But plenty of things.
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Sigh. It is hard to go public about this to all 3 of my readers. Carrie breaking up with me was devastating. I’m still reeling. My mind is a roller-coaster of emotions, gravity trying desperately to pull any narrative to find comfort in the reality of chaos.
I cannot trust myself to think about her. And I definitely can’t trust her.
It’s a funny irony when all the love songs are epics and all the break up songs feel like anthems.
It’s soured a lot of what was good during 2021. Most of those memories are tinted a bitter burnt instead of rosy pink. It’s pretty sad all around. There isn’t a resolution, but as far as I see it, Carrie doesn’t have space to deal with changing what remains and I’m trying my best to leave it all behind as well. So it goes.
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In-between that, this year has been about work. The PT has gone as well as about it can, and I’m back in it to find the last 10%. Right after the surgery, I told myself it would take 2 years of PT every day to get where I needed to be, a mantra to be patient and disciplined. And therefore, with year behind me I find myself happily closer. Another year of work and I promise I will be an Iron Man. First Goal of 2022
It starts with picking up running again. Short 4 miles, keeping it light and doing a lot of foam rolling and stretching. Then add biking in the nice weather. Prospect Park and get my bike back. Plus, where are my shoes and helmet.
Progress will be good if I am running 13 miles around February, and 20 miles around May/June during long runs.
Biking will hopefully come up fast, with April and May getting to the 50-mile mark plus a run, and June/July getting to 100 plus a run. That means a full race in September or October. I might get a bike trainer to get in the saddle before weather lets me do it outside.
Second goal. Publish a book (or two). My travel anthology is already in its second draft state with 38 pieces. I would like to hit 40 before publishing. I will submit to a Fiverr editor on Jan 3rd. After the draft is competed, I will contact some book publishers, probably in February. I don’t know if they’ll buy rights, that seems unlikely. But printing a hundred copies on my own dime in a limited first run would be goal accomplished. The book will end up in the 150-page range, including a few photos if that is okay, price-wise. I would like to sell each book at 35$. And if the pricing for publishing myself is not bad, I will also include the 50 haikus as a small collection.
I will spend a few days during and after vacation to set up some PBA work. I would like to make a petition, portioning about one pomodoro every two days to doing some research and getting the word out. Leveraging Juny and James will be ideal for the legality. Zach and Monica to work on the social outreach. Goal is done if we have any sort of organizing effect by the end of the year, but the initial work needs to be put in early to seed the program.
Finally, I want a PMP. I will likely take the actual test next fall, but the commitment now is to buy a PMP course and start working on the lessons. I also want to ask if Randstad will pay for the training.
The work was hard.
It’s been coming back.
15 Open Mics this year with Shovel. More than a hundred performances from dozens of artists. Every single one was successful, was fantastic. It’s a pleasure to build those things. Including one at Tom’s house. We raised 1200$ for 18Million Rising to combat the Asian Hate wave that struck New York. We celebrated 6 first time performers and many new friends of the mic. Daria and TB have been really invaluable partners to keep me motivated and working hard. Shovel has become a home for me. I learned some sound technical things too.
I’ve also written and performed more, including over other open mics. It’s meant I have honed a real skill to perform poetry, and that’s a huge step towards being the person I envision. The poetry has become an excellent skill. It still has a few more to go, but I am coming across a point that I feel comfortable saying I am a poet because I could pull a full set out about 3 times. Maybe 4 with some repeats.
The Iron Chef was really fun, I always enjoy Val’s family. Her sister was cool. It was difficult but amazing to put together 8 plates in 2 hours. I still think my victory was stolen. If they had judged my plate immediately after consuming, it would be a totally different game! Still. Tied. Next round for the Championship.
I even got a little traveling in, with DC and Charleston being new cities to me. Plus, revisiting Philadelphia and New Orleans, which was fantastic. Fire Island, too, was very fun to explore.
I have been diligent about Spanish, not every day but close to. It’s fun to learn another language, I’m no where close to conversational, but I look forward to finding a time and place to hone it to something more practical.
Writing has gone okay. Only 12 posts on the blog is not great, and I fell off the cliff in August. It was hard to find art after the breakup and a lot of the latest posts have been very negative as I consider where I am in my mindset. But I have written more poems, I even have drafts of essays in stages of completion, and in totality, this blog contains a lot of work I can be proud of.
Repair was a nice part of my year. The lights, the plants, the pants, making things a little better for myself. I learned the sewing machine which has been fun to use and a nice return to learning stuff in Resistor Space.
I have been excellent to my parents who are wonderful to me. I am trying to be kinder and gentle but firm with them and I have really come to value my time with them. I would rather they take some initiative and live outside the rut in Long Island. I have pulled them out as much as I can and have had some moderate success but it hasn’t seemed to stick to their souls yet. Still, I am going to prioritize their experiences and try to give them more from this life. There was no half marathon, I was injured, but we have plenty of time and shoes in the next year to do so. I took my father on one and a half trips. I was really trying to get a second during this holiday season but omicron took that one.
It's far from perfect. These last two years have thrown challenges I never thought I would have to face. I haven’t always acted admirably towards them. But I cannot say that I haven’t given good effort. I cannot say I haven’t made progress towards my goals. I cannot say that I have been idle.
The hope for the future is a tentative, ethereal feeling sometimes. I try to keep myself optimistic, dosing myself with deep drinks draughts from the Tap. The Keg reads delusion, but if you squint through the beer goggles/glasses, you’ll see a way of living.
I am good at getting things done, even at my busiest, I make time for myself and the work I want to do.
I haven’t been AS good as it, in the relationship and the depression both.
But I still have been very good. And the recent weeks have touched excellence. Pretty consistently I might add.
Here’s to 2021, definitely a whole year and then some.
Here’s 2022, where the work gets real and I can come back next December, very proud of the goals I accomplish, once again adding to this totem of progress.