The Less Serious Side of Things

Every year, during the week between Christmas and New Year’s, I go out and buy a new journal for the new year.  In times past, before I started in on the new one, I’ve gone back and read through the old one, astonishing myself with how long a year really is and how unnecessary it was for me to record four to seven sentences about every freaking day of my life.

This year, I am going to spare myself the hour or so of reading and recap the year's journal contents for you from memory (don't worry; I remember all the highlights).

You know how we were talking about how Taylor Swift writes songs about things that the rest of us know instinctively to keep to ourselves and not broadcast to the public?  This is the sort of shit I write about in my daily journal.  As a fitting cap to a year that saw me use this blog to tackle more serious issues than I ever have publicly before, I thought it might be nice to offer you a glimpse into what else I was thinking and writing about this year.

What Was Up with 2012, According to My Journal

1. I got really excited about Downton Abbey.

2. A little over a year ago, I developed a full-fledged crush on [the potential of] a guy in our running group and was gutted beyond measure when he passed me over for someone who is pretty much my exact opposite in every possible way.  Their relationship coincided with him suddenly never showing up to anything, ever, so I had a lot of opportunities to whinge to my journal about how not only did I have zero game, but I was also incapable of forming normal human friendships.  (Both of which are obvious lies, but they worked nicely within the framework of my self-pity narrative, so I went with them whenever I got drunk.)  My determination to make this all about me was drawn out for an embarrassing length of time, and of course I recorded it all, so there’s a lot of that from this year.

3. A little over two years ago, I developed a full-fledged crush on [the potential of] another guy in our running group and this was ridiculous because clearly there was absolutely no way we could ever function as a unit.  Nonetheless, I would periodically revisit my interest in him, and every time, something would happen and I’d get really angry.  Angriness happened twice this year – the second time, I hit some sort of invisible limit and haven’t thought of him the same way since, but the point is that I was still wasting emotional energy on this person after two full years and I wrote quite a bit about it as if this wasn’t moderately psycho of me.

4. Multiple times I extolled the virtues of New Age music.

5. I ran well over 900 miles this year.  Every goddamn time I ran, I wrote about it.

6. There was only one two-day hangover this year, but I wrote about it for, like, four days because if there’s one thing I like, it’s beating the dead horse of being irritated about feeling sick on behalf of a few hours that really weren’t worth it.

7. The presidential election was this year.  I get emotional about politics, but of course I do because I get emotional about Downton freaking Abbey.  This year saw many, many mentions of Statistics God Nate Silver, as well as a discussion of my irrational fear of casting my ballot for the wrong person. For days prior to voting, I was gripped by panic that I would accidentally vote for Mitt Romney.

8. In 2012, I read 60 books (!) and over a dozen short stories.  My very favorite book that I read all year was The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman.  It’s about a boy named Nobody whose entire family is murdered in the first few pages and then he goes and lives in a graveyard and is raised by ghosts.  I wish I’d written it. But since I didn’t, I wrote about how I wished I’d written it.

9. Two good friends got married this year, and a bunch of people had babies.  The weddings I wrote about the days of, since I was there for the festivities.  The babies I usually mentioned a few days after the fact, like, oh yeah, I forgot – so-and-so had a kid. With weddings and babies both, my recordings are usually blasé because marriage and procreation are two of the most basic functions there are in a society, so I can’t ever think of much to say about them.  This is not an opinion I voice to any individuals involved, but my journal gets it all the time.

10. THE WEATHER.  I write down the temperature more often than just about anything else…

11. …except maybe “How I’m Feeling.”  I like to end the week with a several-sentence recap on Sunday night, which is a terrible time to do it because on Sunday night, I’m probably watching Downton Abbey and so all I write is how happy I am that I’m ending the weekend by watching Downton Abbey. But sometimes I’ll also say that I’m feeling “restless” or thereabouts.  When I feel “restless,” there is a 98% chance that the next week I’ll say I’m feeling “hopeful” or “accomplished.”

12. I also record my menstrual cycle (because I like to chart how it syncs up with the phases of the moon) and my feelings of “restlessness” and “hopefulness” can be directly correlated to where I am in my cycle, but I refuse to acknowledge this and instead always, always, always write about how “I don’t know” why I feel the way I do.

13. When John’s home, I’ll write about what he cooked for us; 100% of the time, it’s something ludicrous that took him five hours to make and tastes like consumable bliss.  This is the only time I ever write about food, and if you knew the way I cooked for myself, you’d understand why.

14. I saw fewer movies this year than I have in any year in recent memory (22), but the good ones (The Dark Knight Rises, The Perks of Being a Wallflower, Lincoln, Life of Pi) got a parenthetical four or five word review on the days I saw them.

15. I once filled up an entire day's entry wondering if I should get a third fish.  In the end, I decided it would be too much responsibility and instead acquired a eighth plant.

***

2012, man!  It happened!  It was a pretty good year for me, and if we learned anything from the last entry, it's that "pretty good" is some kind of alright.

I'm headed back down to Mississippi to see my parents and brother, so if I'm not back here in the next few days,

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!

And I hope that each and every one of you has a pretty good 2013. ;)