What are you doing New Year's Eve?

 Party for one, please

 Buh-bye 2020

Today, I finished off 2020 in style. After a short work morning, I headed out to go sledding with a couple of work pals. We filled our lungs with air, sped down, spun around, laughed hysterically, trudged back up, got a few bruises, and laughed some more. Then we headed inside and Sara and I watched RBG, which I've been meaning to get to, and now highly recommend. Such a good way to round of this year!

 

I've also been listening to Winter Solstice, and my New Year's Eve 2020-2021 playlist!

Back home, I made Tom Kha, and sat slurping noodles before the fire.

 

 

 Then headed upstairs for a bit of festivity, 

a little something bubbly, 

The Holiday, and Age of Adeline.

 Let's start the new year right...

With a fond goodbye

And our hopes as high

As a kite

  

"Come on, dance with me. 

The world is spinning, we can't just stand on it."

“For centuries champagne has been used to launch marriages and ships. Most assume this is because the drink is so intrinsically celebratory; but, in fact, it is used at the onset of these dangerous enterprises because it so capably boosts one’s resolve. When the glass was placed on the table, the Count took a swig large enough to tickle his sinuses.” 

 

Wishing you a New Year filled with hope like dandelions, growth like a young tree, and light like the sunrise to shine into all the dark shadows.

100 Books of 2020

This year I exceeded my normal reading goal of 52 books in a year. With all that was going on around me, I often needed to shut out the world, and immerse myself in story. More often than not it was an unabridged audiobook. This year wasn't really one for taking it slow. It was a pel-mel kind of year. And crowded more with books and less with people. So I don't necessarily desire a repeat of this for every person or every year. But it was a good way to add solace to the long hours of 2020. To inspire and escape, to give insight and courage, and a broader horizon. I read 25 of them with my eyes, listened to 75 audiobooks. 26 I'd read before, and 74 were new to me...

Some were old

Some were new

Some were borrowed

Some were true

Many were audio

A few dog-eared

Quite a few gems

A couple were weird

I'm inclined to the mystery

As you can no doubt tell

Perhaps its that most

Are wrapped up rather well

I don't need an idyll

A rose-tinted lorgnette 

But show me the courage

I haven't mustered quite yet

Give examples of wit

Sharp thought, action, grace

That serve me as tools

For this world that we face

 

Nine Coaches Waiting - Mary Stewart

Requiem for a Mezzo - Carola Dunn

Joy in the Morning - P.G. Wodehouse (rr)

Death on the Flying Scotsman - Carola Dunn

The Moonspinners - Mary Stewart

A Gentleman in Moscow - Amor Towles (rr)

Damsel in Distress - Carola Dunn

To Be Where You Are - Jan Karon

Prince Caspian - C.S. Lewis (rr)

Death in Berlin - M.M. Kaye (rr)

The Piper on the Mountain - Ellis Peters (rr)

Becoming - Michelle Obama

Dead in the Water - Carola Dunn

Wildfires at Midnight - Mary Stewart

Airs Above the Ground - Mary Stewart (rr)

Hound of the Baskervilles - Arthur Conan Doyle (rr)

The Crystal Cave - Mary Stewart

Styx and Stones - Carola Dunn

The Red Keep - Allen French (rr)

Death in the Andamans - M.M. Kaye

Black is the Color of My True Love's Heart -Ellis Peters

Now May You Weep - Deborah Crombie

Rattle His Bones - Carola Dunn

My Brother Michael - Mary Stewart (rr)

To Davy Jones Below - Carola Dunn

A Gentleman of Leisure - P.G. Wodehouse (rr)

The Lightning Thief - Rick Riordan (rr)

The Potter's Field - Ellis Peters (rr)

A Share in Death - Deborah Crombie

Digital Minimalism - Cal Newport

The Case of the Murdered Muckraker - Carola Dunn

All Shall be Well - Deborah Crombie

Leave the Grave Green - Deborah Crombie

Mourn Not Your Dead - Deborah Crombie

Kingdom of the Blind - Louise Penny

Son of Neptune - Rick Riordan (rr)

Dreaming of the Bones - Deborah Crombie

Crime on the Fens - Joy Ellis

Shadow over the Fens - Joy Ellis

Hunted on the Fens - Joy Ellis

Kissed a Sad Goodbye - Deborah Crombie

Killer on the Fens - Joy Ellis

A Finer End - Deborah Crombie

Wild in the Hollow - Amber C. Haines

Justice There is None - Deborah Crombie

In a Dark House - Deborah Crombie

 

Unnatural Causes - P.D. James

The Door Before - N.D. Wilson (rr)

The Dragon's Tooth - N.D. Wilson (rr)

Over Sea, Under Stone - Susan Cooper (rr)

Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll

Journey to Munich - Jacqueline Winspear

How to be an Anti-Racist - Ibram X. Kendi

The Grave's a Fine and Private Place - Alan Bradley

 

The Beholder -Anna Bright

The Grass Widow's Tale - Ellis Peters

The House of Green Turf - Ellis Peters (rr)

The Hate U Give - Angie Thomas

Mistletoe and Murder - Carola Dunn

Die Laughing - Carola Dunn

Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone - J.K. Rowling (rr)

A Mourning Wedding - Carola Dunn

Under Gemini - Rosamund Pilcher

Are Women Human? - Dorothy Sayers, essays

The Sign of Four - Arthur Conan Doyle (rr)

The Gate Keeper - Charles Todd

The Fall of the Philanderer - Carola Dunn

A Shilling for Candles - Josephine Tey

The Singing Sands - Josephine Tey

A Test of Wills - Charles Todd

Damsel in Distress - Carola Dunn (rr)

The Gunpowder Plot - Carola Dunn

Maisie Dobbs - Jacqueline Winspear

A Forgotten Place - Charles Todd

Marianna - Susanna Kearsley

The Shadowy Horses - Susannah Kearsley

Winter Sea - Susanna Kearsley

Frederica - Georgette Heyer

The Quiet Gentleman - Georgette Heyer (rr)

Feather on the Moon - Phyllis Whitney

Mourning Raga - Ellis Peters

An Unmarked Grave - Charles Todd

My Cousin Rachel - Daphne du Murier

The Bloody Tower - Carola Dunn

The Rose Garden - Susanna Kearsley

Birds of a Feather - Jacqueline Winspear

Footsteps in the Dark - Georgette Heyer (rr)

Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen (rr)

Perilous Gard - Elizabeth Marie Pope (rr)

The Thief - Megan Whalen Turner (rr)

The Splendour Falls - Susanna Kearsley

Bellewether - Susanna Kearsley

The Firebird - Susanna Kearsley

Renaissance Buck - Georgette Heyer

Becoming Mrs. Lewis - Patti Callahan

 

Shepherds Abiding - Jan Karon (rr)

Mistletoe and Murder -Carola Dunn (rr)

 

A Christmas Resolution -Anne Perry  

 

The Dark is Rising - Susan Cooper (rr)

 

Hercule Poirot's Christmas - Agatha Christie 

2020 is hindsight

'Which of all my important nothings shall I tell you first?' - Jane Austen

Man, 2020 was a hell of a decade, yes?

But let me tell you something. You never have to do this year again. You made it through 2020, and well done. There was nothing easy about it. Next year may not be easy either, but what it will not be is a repeat of this one. And you come into the year '21 with new strengths, new insights. Maybe with some new wounds too, new burdens. But take heart my friend, we'll go together... 'on this uncertain road that lies ahead. Our faithful God has always gone before us, and he will lead the way once again.'  

Come with me as we whirl back through a year so full that I can scarcely keep track of all it contained. A year full of both world turmoil and personal tragedy for so many of us. Below is a very limited list of some of the things we've been carrying this year:

Wildfires, a deadly pandemic, quarantines, shortages, unemployment, masks and gloves and sanitizer, no sports or olympics or museums or libraries, or travel. Virtual church and school and family gatherings, brexit, NYC a war-zone with the virus, plane crashes, ufos, the president is impeached. We lose Kobe Bryant, T'challa, RBG, Sean Connnery, and many others closer to home. George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, police brutality and murder, lynchings, protests and riots, curfews and teargas, widespread civil rights marches. Instability in Russia, neo-nazis in Germany, explosion in Beirut, floods in Indonesia, riots in Delhi. Earthquakes, volcanoes, locusts, murder hornets. A threatened election, conspiracy theories, widespread misinformation. Poland accidentally invaded the Czech Republic (don't worry, Switzerland has accidentally invaded Liechtenstein at least three times in recent years).   

Seem a bit heavy? That's why you're tired, dear ones. And you know I haven't counted your own personal struggles in this summary. It seems with every mounting tension in the world came more news of crisis for our near and dear. This year especially, we must remember:

We're all grieving something: show grace  

Just now, lay down the burden that has been this year. Our minds are full and our hearts are heavy. In the new year you can be strengthened by your knowledge, made gentle by your pain, and made wiser by the suffering we have witnessed and borne. But you don't need to carry the responsibility, the turmoil, the confusion, or the despair of 2020. You don't have to force life-lessons, or perfect understanding. 

In order to meet this year with the wit, wisdom, heart, and humility it required, we took in a lot of information. Mostly it was necessary, but it has been unendingly wearying. Did anyone else read Digital Minimalism this year and go, yeah I'm really going to implement that: and then holy hannah did life hit the fan?

'still, everything happens for a reason is no reason not to ask yourself: am i living it right?' -John Mayer

But however we got here, and whatever we've got left, take a deep breath now. Inhale. Exhale. Even as connection gets more difficult, our awareness of our fellow-man has been strengthened. We're sadder perhaps, but stronger too; fuller. Confused, maybe; but I hope, wiser.  We leave those in God's hands now, and breathe again. You get to take all that you have and are into the coming year: your glory and potential, and your wounds yet to be healed. But not the weight of this year. Leave that behind.

 

“The world is indeed full of peril, and in it there are many dark places; but still there is much that is fair, and though in all lands love is now mingled with grief, it grows perhaps the greater.” -LOTR 

there was light

new life and babies

teatime and boldness

 

and grief

 

Great grief 

 

Hope for change

 

 Birthdays

Work and rest

Loss, and empowerment

dear ones, and the great outdoors

walks by the river, day after day. bridges at dusk

masking, working, recuperating after the audit...

and art and art and art

 

I am tempted at this juncture to insert a suitable quote about art. Perhaps that one about "then what are we fighting for" but unfortunately, Churchill didn't actually say it. Or that one by Lewis where he says that friendship and art give value to survival. Which is true. But the greater quote states that the reverse isn't true: that friendship, philosophy, and art have no survival value; and the longer I live the more I find this to be unequivocally false. (If you're wondering, I do believe Jack would have liked me better for arguing the point, rather than swallowing it.) I think I am eminently more likely to survive, thrive, and reproduce (see definition of survival value) when supported by friendship, fueled by philosophy, grounded and inspired by art. What better year to establish and assess such a tenet? When each of these three are tested to the full. Some crumble and must be remade. But without them, I never would have made it this far... 

  “For what matters in life is not whether we receive a round of applause; what matters is whether we have the courage to venture forth despite the uncertainty of acclaim.” - A Gentleman in Moscow

I'm beginning to feel old. Don't laugh, I know I could have two-thirds of my life ahead of me still. But there does come a certain tipping point in your twenties when you feel much more pre-thirty than post-twenty, college kids feel like children, and you realize really and truly: this isn't a transition period or a trial run: this is the adulthood talked of and prepped for: the life I'm living right now is who I really am. This is your life. If there's something you wanted to do with it, the time is now. If there's a person you want to be, show up as her. Every day is a vote for the person I want to be. Habits, time, money: it's okay to spend these on things that make you happy. On things that make your life the one you want to be the Leading Lady of every day. Life's too short to procrastinate that novel, to wear underwear you don't like, or to not have a thermos that suits your morning commute. 

"After all, did not wine improve with age? Was it not the passage of years that gave a piece of furniture its delightful patina? When all was said and done, the endeavors that most modern men saw as urgent (such as appointments with bankers and the catching of trains), probably could have waited, while those they deemed frivolous (such as cups of tea and friendly chats) had deserved their immediate attention.” -
A Gentleman in Moscow

And so I subscribed to the NYTimes' Sunday paper this year, even though I don't have the perfect spot to sit and read it with my coffee in the morning.

Amidst the general chaos of December I jumped on an inspiring idea, and I'm halfway through writing a novelette

I loaded up my car with thrift store stuff and went to my sisters to decorate for Christmas

(Also taught my nieces and nephews to do crosswords and sudoku)

I wrote up my resume

I started taking walks at dusk, over the city bridge, just as the lights came on

I illustrated my book

Sang in church

Wrote songs and poetry and spoken words

Learned to drive a motorboat

Discovered I could watercolor

Was prayed over many times as the Weight came crashing down on me and I could feel nothing but the pain. God was gracious, and I can see again, and hope and pray and sing. 

Next year, maybe I'll dance.

I didn't get to many of my resolutions for this year, because 2020, but I exercised diligently until the gyms closed, I read way more than 52 books this year, I found healthcare, whitened my teeth a little, wrote sonnets and worked on fiction...

And held onto hope.

Unsurprisingly, I can't recall all of the things I did this year, small and important. Or big and memorable but swallowed up in the tumult. I expect you can't either. But I'd love to hear if there's something that stands out to you from your year. A milestone, or a joy that helped carry you; a defining moment. Remind me of what I've forgotten, or tell me something I don't know.

This year was hard, but I'm holding on, like you. We will not back down from truth. We will learn to be bold. To heal. To find joy. To reach out to each other across our differences. 

We will remember this year, but we will not carry it with us.

And in the riot of this beautiful, aching world,  

"when you can't look on the bright side, I will sit with you in the dark"

 “He had said that our lives are steered by uncertainties, many of which are disruptive or even daunting; but that if we persevere and remain generous of heart, we may be granted a moment of lucidity—a moment in which all that has happened to us suddenly comes into focus as a necessary course of events, even as we find ourselves on the threshold of the life we had been meant to lead all along.” -
A Gentleman in Moscow

I'm off to listen to John Mayer and drift off to sleep, dreaming of a new year as fresh as a spring day.