I opened my year review of 2019 by declaring that it was… tumultuous. There are a few things readily apparent about that statement. The first is that it’s true. 2019 was a year of tumult and change for me, but it was mostly self-inflicted. A new job, a cross-country move, a return to being more or less alone in the world, and the real start of my self-publishing journey. In the end, the one thing I prayed for in the year 2020 was peace. A chance to settle, regroup, and plow ahead feeling a little more recharged.
It is at this point I slam a shot of espresso and cry into the void.
Let’s get the bad out of the way, because there’s obviously a lot of it. My industry stands on the verge of the apocalypse. The looming threat of constitutional crisis hangs over the country. I am about to enter at least two months of being unemployed, with only the promise of a future for myself and my career on the other side at all. (Want to know a great way to support me in this trying time? Buy and review my book(s) (more on that later)). My friends are scattered across the country and the means and just the safety of visiting them is entirely up in the air. The 2021 I enter, I enter with less fanfare and less energy than I had going into 2020.
At this point last year I was preparing to fly down and visit my best friend in Florida. At the same point this year, none of those things are possible (not the least because they are now in a different state and pursing their own career shift and I am immensely proud of them!).
But that’s not to say I’m entering it with less hope.
2020 saw, first, the consumption of some of the most impactful pieces of media I’ve read/watched in a long time. Per recommendation, I read The French Lieutenant’s Woman, and on my own Normal People, both of which are now near the top of my favorite books of all time (The Sun Also Rises is in no danger of being overthrown, but alas). (Top 10 Books a good blog topic? Stay tuned!) The year closed with Soul, a movie that’s hitting harder than I thought it would. 2020 brought me to New York on two separate occasions: Once for a concert with my favorite band and once for a wine conference that kept that passion alive through the shutdowns that followed. I found another favorite band whose music helped change my perspectives on some of my relationships and how I’m handling life (“Abandon all the stupid dreams about the girl I could have been, my dear” and “No man should have more of my time than me” anyone?). The year introduced me to my new favorite musical (Hadestown, man. Can’t get enough).
These two favorite bands both released new music in 2020, so wins all around!
The year in review reveals… a wealth of growth and opportunities. Beginning with that friend, the lifechanging choices made in Florida (I also asked Florida for a better year and here we are…), started a path where I really feel I’ve had a chance to live more than I have before. The summer saw me getting to spend more time with some of my favorite people (safely) if not in all of my favorite places (Sorry, Boston. It’s been a while, huh? But Vermont got to know me well again!) I did move into my own space again, and that’s been such a welcome mental relief I can’t begin to explain.
A couple nights ago I had one of my friends over, and as we lay together and discussed all the great existential questions of our age we talked about how I underestimate my own productivity, since (full disclosure), productivity is my default state and is intricately tied to my feeling of self-worth (not healthy but reality). That’s one of the reasons why this year has been such of a struggle, with a career that feels in constant jeopardy and long periods of “inaction.” But, on the other hand, and something I need to appreciate more…
I wrote TWO books this year alone! Twelve short stories (kind of) that are all for FREE RIGHT HERE!! I self-published the final two parts of A Place I Have Never Been (Part II available here and Part III here).
And maybe that’s part of what makes 2020 such a hard year to review, but also the theme I’ll assign it. 2020 for me came to be defined by appreciation, a feeling in part assisted and supported by the movie Soul. In a year that has sought to take everything from us, we can take the time to reflect on everything we have, and everything we have done, even if that’s just surviving because in 2020 that’s… enough. And surviving looks different to different people, and it feels different, too. Appreciation changes person to person, too.
A quote from The French Lieutenant’s Woman is valuable here: “His statement to himself should have been ‘I possess this now, therefore I am happy,’ instead of what it so Victorianly was, ‘I cannot possess this forever, and therefore am sad.’”
2020 taught me to appreciate that friend lying beside me because I know it won’t be that way forever. The few times I’ve actually gotten to set the tables at work, really set them with glassware and flatware and candles, I’ve taken pictures of it because it’s rare and it’s special. I appreciate music more, how it makes me feel and think. The chance to be outside, to smile at someone, to see loved ones, to give gifts. Even the chances to write, far too frequent this year, will be appreciated when the world returns to whatever we redefine as normal, be that in 2021 or 2022.
2021 begins, therefore, as a year on edge. Great change could follow, or the great slide back into something we only think of as normality. My personal goal for the year is to write a haiku a day, and start on a new fantasy series I’ve been worldbuilding up. Look for whispers of a sequel to A Place I Have Never Been, and its complete version (whaaaat??). The next two months will also see me plotting out a better handling of my industry, a commitment to what it means to work in food and wine and hospitality, and hopefully the beginnings of a great year there, whenever we reopen.
And I will appreciate all of it.
One final song lyric, curtesy of the Crane Wives:
“I’ve got no money but the change that jingles in my pocket, reminding me how little I have. But as for time… as for time? It’s mine… It’s mine.”