New Year's Resolution List for 2014

Instead of making the usual list--the one where I promise to exercise four times a week, to give up my vices, to be kinder to the elderly, to write every day--I've decided to make a list of the anti-positive promises to make to myself, perhaps as a way to ensure success and increase my self-esteem.

1. Eat more frosting. During my work holiday party this year, I got an ugly sweater cookie mix. I attempted to make the frosting. The package came with both red and green colors. Unfortunately, I skipped the part where I read the order of ingredients, and so put in the coloring, the egg, the milk, and the butter in all at once. When I went to blend it with my seldom-used electric mixer, the red food coloring rebelled against the not room temperature butter, and splattered all over the place, leaving dime-sized splotches all over my sweater, and the floor, so that it looked as if a small animal had been violently murdered. I put everything aside, and the next day, Dan bought store made frosting and I used that instead. There was some left over, so, not wanting to waste any of it, I spread a generous amount on a graham cracker. Heaven. I must do that more often. Less baking, more frosting consumption.

2. Increase the frequency of eye twitches. Since the move and starting my new job, I've developed a slight twitch in my right eye. Perhaps it's the weather in New Jersey, perhaps it's my frequent blinking at the new sights surrounding me, perhaps it's the Jersey drivers--whatever the cause, the twitch has been my constant companion, a little flutter every few seconds, not so that you would notice. I mean, no one has asked me if I'm having a seizure, so my goal now will be to increase these, either in frequency or in severity (or both) until someone notices or until I'm unable to walk in a straight line.

3. Be ruder to strangers. I find that I'm always poised to apologize to people, even those who cut in line at the coffee shop. I don't know if it's a woman thing--this ever present need to say sorry for taking up space, but I'd like to turn that impulse around and say what I'm thinking instead. For example, yesterday, the doorbell rang, and it was some dude who lives across from us, explaining to me that my guests (my mom and Dan's mom) were not allowed to park in the empty parking spaces across the street, even though the slots aren't marked as reserved. He told me that guests need to park down the street, near the dumpsters. I said, Oh, sorry! even though I wasn't at all sorry, and felt more annoyed that he was asking me to move the cars in the freezing cold. Next time, instead of making nice and obeying, I'll tell the person to get lost and perhaps shove him away. Though I do think he felt bad, as he followed me in his car and gave me and Lillian a ride back to the house.

4. Watch more TV. I never did get through a single episode to Breaking Bad, and I barely know what's happening on any of the Real Housewives series. I watch maybe two hours of TV a night, a little less if Luke's around as I tend to check out if Batman Returns is on again (see previous post).  If I eat in front of the television, I could get a good four hours in each night; more if I stay up later and give up reading entirely. I would watch more if 20/20 and Dateline had their own channel--I love the shows where someone commits a senseless crime and is brought to justice (most all of these shows end with the guy you know did it going  to jail--usually the boyfriend--and it's satisfying to think that somewhere in the world, the bad guys are getting their just desserts, though one does wonder how they came to be criminals in the first place. One does consider that possibly they didn't grow up in the best of circumstances, though the shows don't often have time to go into the psychology, they have a formula to maintain and a time limit--no sense in trying to create a larger social argument about poverty or lack of education or child abuse which would just complicate the issue).

That's a good start. I don't want to make promises I can't keep, such as writing in this blog more--that's something that's always on my mind, hovering there like a little ghost, hanging out in the corner of my eye like the aforementioned twitch. I sometimes just don't feel like I have anything of interest to share; or the energy to begin. That's the biggest hurdle for any resolution--starting, sitting down, concentrating, finding a way to move forward. I believe the frosting will help.