The Odds and Ends Drawer

"So, this year I'm not making resolutions. I've decided I don't want a "new year, new me." Really, it's taken a lifetime to get to this "me," and I'm pretty happy with who I am and all the little graces that have made me me. My hope is next year at this time I'll be pretty happy to be me, too.  

This year I'm going to do something different. I'm going to list the things that I randomly started doing at some point this year that I've decided to keep doing. They've made my year better. My only hope is that 2016 will add to this list. Either way, I think it's going to be a good year. "  Emily Heath

So Emily says it the way I am thinking about it.  
It's taken a lifetime to get to this "me".  And while certainly far from perfect and striving to be a better me all the time…I don't see resolutions as the way forward toward that goal.  Picking the things in 2015 that I see now as worth keeping and completing and leading to new insights…yes.  

Last year's "journal word for the year" was attentiveness.  I love that word.  I plan not to substitute another word but to ADD to that word.  This year's word is wabi-sabi.  Which is the Japanese untranslatable word(s) meaning the beauty of imperfection…things with rust and patina, like me.  

I almost picked ephemera for my word…meaning "things that exist or are used or enjoyed for only a short time".  This is a word that journaling has taught me the meaning of.  The word used to relate only to paper items but now in common usage it refers to just about anything you find interesting or like that is "bits and pieces" of life normally thrown away but saved for some personal reason.  

If you go through your "odds and ends" drawer you will see what I mean.  We all have those drawers which accumulate old keys, ribbons,  ticket stubs, and the menu for the carry out Chinese restaurant that went out of business four years ago.  I just checked.  Mine has candle stubs (you never know when you might carve a pumpkin), kitchen magnets and a bag of balloons (you never know when a party might break out).  Perhaps my mantra should be "ya never know".  Ain't that the truth.  

So carry on with what was the best of last year.  "Happy" is what you can choose if you wish.  It's all up to each of us to make that decision.  It takes less and less for me these days.  Good coffee and marveling at the color of the sky at dawn gives me great comfort these days.  Watching my pink hibiscus open as the sunshine touches them each morning.  Listening to the soft even breathing of my husband beside me at night.  Getting an email from one of my children or grandchildren, making some art that pleases me, and finding the "thin" places in the world once in a while.