Never been big on New Year’s resolutions, they’re fleeting in nature, over-enthusiastic and usually doomed to failure. But 2011 got me a little shook up to be honest so this year it’s time to get my house in order. It’s going to take more than the superficial waving of a duster and a quick vacuum round the edges too.
Health
The last day of the year often judgementally watches me inhaling the final Ferrero Rochers and making vague promises to myself that a detox is on the cards as from TOMORROW. Nothing but steamed broccoli and tofu for me while I whip these soggy thighs into shape. By 2nd January it has usually come to my attention that there’s still a tube of Pringles in the Christmas Cupboard and the Baileys isn’t quite finished, and well, it’d be WASTEFUL to just let it all go off, right? My ethics are more important to me than my waistline SURELY?
So I promise myself this: No more diet disasters. I’m going to start on a long-term plan to improve my health without wrecking my social life (this all sounds very sensible and must mean I am officially a grown-up. Which only took 35 years, so kudos to ME).
Instead, I’m going to learn to look after my liver and lungs. The Bearded Curmudgeon had a bit of a health scare at the end of last year that had me panicking, pouring bottles of wine down the sink and buying life insurance. Tests ruled out our worst fears, although we’re still waiting to find out exactly what jiggery pokery is going on with his innards.
It did force to me assess the way we live more critically and come to the conclusion that if either of us did get properly poorly sick, quite frankly it’d be our own stupid faults. Moo doesn’t deserve to spend her teenage years changing our colostomy bags and hooking up our oxygen tanks as we cough and splutter into middle age.
This kick up the jacksy has resulted in some good changes. We’ve both quit smoking. While I’m a bit of a social smoker (maybe one in the evening, unless it’s raining, but mostly when I’m out drinking), the Bearded Curmudgeon had a nasty habit. I’m pleased to report that as of tomorrow, we’ve both ditched the cancer sticks for a whole week with only one major nicotine-deprived argument in the process.
I’ve also resolved to go dry for three days a week minimum, all year. That’s right, not even a small sherry for medicinal purposes will touch these lips on Sundays, Mondays and Thursdays. Not even if Moo takes it upon herself to spend 24 hours yelling in my face and lobbing food at the walls like an olympian shot put hopeful. So far, so good.
Wealth
For the past umm, four years, I have been the self-employed director of a small but well-regarded user experience agency. I love it. I love my work and I love being able to arrange my hours to fit in good quality time with Moo, but it’s been a tough ride. We battled through a ‘credit crunch’ that quickly slid into a recession. I kept going through pregnancy and a new baby, then moved to an island where I had to fight with ferry companies to get me to meetings on time (which they rarely did). Due to financial naivety more than anything, my business partner and I have ended up working miles away from each other, with an office that is rarely ever occupied. I feel isolated and lonely. I spend a good 25% of my time persuading people to pay us.
So I’ve made a decision to return to the world of regular wage checks, rounds of tea-making and office politics. I’m going to go back to working for the man. This will be challenging in many ways. The daily grind of commuting, earlier start times for the Moo and I, longer hours at nursery, but I know that I need to share my working days again and focus on the job, rather than the administration.
I may have to take a bit of a pay dip in the long term but the regularity of my income should compensate for this and help to ensure that I stick to my next resolution: to get financially organised once and for all.
I promise myself that this year I will pay off my personal debt, start a pension, and begin saving the deposit required for us to move house in the next couple of years. I’m assuming equity in our current pad won’t magically reappear. Bloody bankers.
Happiness
My work does afford me some creativity. I get to take a wider view and put myself in other people’s shoes in order to make recommendations for businesses to move their products forward. This often involves an element of design and it’s enough to scratch the creative itch that settled into my bones as a teenager and has laid there ever since.
A quick scratch is never enough to truly satisfy you though is it? Innuendo aside, I still find myself playing the “I wish” game too frequently. I wish I had more time to bake, I wish I could learn to sew, I wish I had the guts and determination to write like I’d love to.
This Christmas the Bearded Curmudgeon reminded me why I heart him for more than his great big grizzly bear cuddles and amazing capacity to store food in his facial hair for emergency situations. He literally bought me everything I need to do all the things I constantly claim to covet, including an evening course at a local college for support in writing a first novel. Seriously, how cool is that? Almost compensates for how hilarious he finds his own flatulence.
So my final promise to myself is to stop talking about and start doing all the things I’ll regret never giving a go. I think it’s probably the most important one of all.
Wish me luck 🙂
The Finagler 