Susan Writes

I don’t know what to do or where to start.  It’s a new year.  And there are so many things that I want and need to do.  Knit a cap for my Colorado Grand?  Stitch pajama pants for my Grands who live across town?  Finish the quilt that Grandma Gladys started fifty years ago?  Bake bread to take to my sick friend?  Sort and throw away outdated medicines? Finish reading the book I started before Christmas?

I love new beginnings.  Mondays.  New calendars.  When I taught school, I liked the beginning of a Science unit and a new list of spelling words.  So I should welcome 2013.  But I’m frazzled with all the choices.  Clean out the kitchen cabinets?  I put clean dishes in those cabinets so where do all the crumbs come from?  Move the bed and vacuum the dust monsters?  They’re too big to be called bunnies.  If I hadn’t dropped my bookmark behind the bed, I’d never seen the monsters.  Ignorance was bliss.  Take pictures and write stories about the family heirlooms in my house?  I can’t expect my children to remember that five blue glasses belonged to Great-Grandmother Rich and that Daddy mailed the green wooden box to Mother while he was stationed in Germany during WWII.

Four years ago when I retired, I wrote a list of things to do, places to see, and people to spend time with.  I’m too big a coward to even look at that list.  But I remember that I thought I’d get back to playing the piano.  Why have a piano if no one plays it?  I’d sew dresses and rompers for my Grands; skirts for myself.  I’d exercise.  I’d throw dinner parties.  Explore the blue highways in the Upper Cumberland.  Eat lunch with friends.  Learn something new every day.

As I sit with my fingers on my computer, I create a new folder for this year’s columns.  Where We Are 2013.  Should I take time to trash and organize scattered documents in the 2012 folder?  Update my computer?  The loud buzzer on the dryer relieves my indecision.  I hang Husband’s and my shirts.  There’s the raccoon costume lying on the sewing machine by the ironing board.  Right after Halloween, I promised my Grand that I’d mend it.  It’ll only take ten minutes.  I could stitch it now.

Focus.  Make a plan, my brain says.  2013 – a chance to start new.  What should I do for the next 365 days.  Recently, I read a devotion that suggested choosing one word for a New Year’s resolution.  One word to guide each day’s choices.  Each day’s activities.   Suggested words:  courage, faith, patience, simplify, study, action, generous.  What about balance or love?

So here I am.  The beginning of a new year and I’m in a quandary.  Choices.  Lists.  Resolutions.  The phone rings.  “Gran?”  I hear the sweet voice of my seven-year-old Grand.  “Are you coming to see us today?”

Yes.

Filed under: Everyday Life, Family, Friends | Tagged: Choices, Grandchildren, New Year, Resolutions |