Monthly Archives: December 2024

Blogging, Celebrate, Clarity, Inspiration, Lifestyle, Mindset, Reading, Self-Reflection, Word of the Year

So Long 2024/Cheers to 2025

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Like many of my fellow bloggers, I declared a WOTY for 2024. I chose the word “growth”.

I started out like gangbusters. I read the book “Atomic Habits”, which led me to affix happy little stickers onto the frame of my vision board each day that I met my goals (like writing daily and eating vegetables every day). I made progress, and I felt good about it.

This new habit lasted about 2 months, give or take.

I honestly can’t say what happened that threw me off course. Yet, it’s not like I completely abandoned my attempts at growth in these areas; I just neglected to track it daily with my stickers.

This is not to say I didn’t manage any growth this year. It’s just that the growth I achieved was less measurable. It was more on the inside.

I attribute my growth largely to my mission of reading daily. I didn’t reach my true goal of reading 24 books in the year 2024, but I don’t really care about that. It’s completely beside the point.

My reading obsession opened up my intellect and my imagination. Some of the books I read left me awe-struck, and some of them taught me new tricks. Many of them inspired me and some confused me. The more I read, the more I wanted to read. Let’s just say I’m going to keep it up.

In 2024, my thoughts about and relationship with money grew into something healthier (bottom line: it comes and it goes, and it’s all okay). I got smarter about how I spent it which sparked my creativity. With the help of a therapist, I gained more self-awareness. The vision of what I want my life to look like when I’m retired came into sharper focus this year. I have a bit more clarity about how I want to define myself as a writer who blogs. My hope going into the New Year is for that clarity to be evident in the stories I tell and the thoughts I share in this space.

It was also very much a year of strengthening relationships and learning to appreciate the differences between me and the people I am close to. An epiphany I recently had is that while I accept that I am not everybody’s “cup of tea”, whether that be IRL or on social media…neither are you. Nor is anyone else. Kind of takes the pressure off, don’t you think?

It’s good to remember that each of us has the power to choose how we frame things in our mind.

So, let’s turn the page to a new year. I’m planning to move through 2025 as intentionally as possible.

How about you?

To cap off the end of 2024, here’s a song with an inspiring message to carry us all into 2025.

Happy New Year, friends!

family, Humor, Storytelling

Story Time with Jim

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Someone I admire recently gave me the nudge I needed to follow through with this plan, which had been in my head for the last couple of months, to start capturing family stories.

Thanks, Stephanie H.

I’ve had the pleasure of spending time with my almost 90 year-old father-in-law, Jim, since last month, asking him to tell me his stories. Anyone who knows this man knows that he loves to tell stories (and talk political conspiracies) about his life growing up in Mexico.

Mexico, Missouri that is.

Here’s a little tale Jim told me recently.

Jim and his friend, Jimmy, purchased an old Model A together back around 1950. My MIL, Alice, commented, as he was telling this story, “you know there was going to be trouble when you had two ‘Jimmys'”. They’d drive it to school (they were about 16 at the time), then Jimmy would drive it to his after school job and our Jim would walk to the body shop where he worked after school. Then, when his work was done, Jimmy’s sister would pick Jim up in that Model A and drive him home.

Jim said that one night, he took the Model A out for a drive on his own. It was dark inside the vehicle (no inside lights in cars at that time), so Jim didn’t see that the gas tank was leaking. Fuel pumps had yet to be invented, so the gas tank was actually inside the vehicle, on the dashboard. It had to be higher up than the engine under the hood, so that gravity could allow the gas to get into the engine.

Jim drove it a ways down the road, and when he shifted it into a higher gear, it backfired and flames erupted inside. He said he “bailed out”, thankful that he had just installed a handle inside the door, and then watched, while he was on fire himself, the Model A careen down the road, fully ablaze. He thought to himself “now I’m going to have to leave town” because he was certain that the car was going to drive itself into town and set the whole place on fire. Fortunately, the Model A crashed into a ditch before that could happen.

As Jim was flailing about after bailing out of the Model A, there was what he called a “tramp or a hobo” walking along who quickly threw off his coat and covered Jim with it to extinguish the flames.

This could be known as the story where we all thank that unhoused person for saving Jim’s life. If he hadn’t, he wouldn’t have met Alice or fathered 3 kids. I wouldn’t have met Mr. NOA and we wouldn’t have our kids together. Our grandson wouldn’t exist.

So, thanks “Mr. Hobo”, and Merry Christmas to you, wherever you are.

American Politics, Christmas, Lifestyle, Rage, Truth

Christmas Witch?

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She is who greets you when you open the front door at my house here in Minnesconsin right now.

While my brain is currently immersed in all things Christmas, I can’t bring myself to take her off the wall where she hangs.

Maybe it’s because I’m feeling like a crone these days, what with the gray hair coming in hot on my head, the fact that I peed a little after a big sneeze (thanks, pepper!) this morning, and an eye infection that leaves me no choice but to forgo wearing contacts and eye makeup for the forseeable future.

Sorry, readers, but today you’re getting a little less “Pollyanna” from me and a little more “Pissy Polly”.

My witch is speaking to me these days. Call me bitter, quirky, or unhinged if you must, but I can’t bear to retire her to storage in my basement just yet. She started out as this retro, fun Halloween decoration for me (found at my favorite local shopping venue), and now she has evolved into something else. The power of the witch, perhaps?

My witch represents to me the feelings I’m experiencing lately. Anger at what my fellow Americans and I are up against with the incoming tRump administration. Rage about how little respect is being given to the civil servants and military personnel with the (current) Cabinet picks. Sheer frustration with the complete disregard for women’s rights, and the rights of marginalized folks like those in the LGBTQ+ community in this country.

So my witch is staying put. Though she will be bedazzled for Christmas. I’m too anal a person when it comes to decorating my house or putting together an outfit to wear, for that matter, to allow her to stick out like a sore Halloween thumb throughout this holiday season.

I feel like there’s a metaphor in there somewhere, right?

Anyway…a song to match my mood (and maybe yours?) for your listening pleasure.