Resolutions
So, here are my New Year's resolutions:
1. Stop bugging b!X about finding paid work.
2. Get out of the apartment every day, even if it's just for a walk around the building.
3. Start doing a personal "Thursday's at Borders" so that I can start to build a new routine for myself. (And I can pick up Metroland and see what's going on around town and actually sit down a read for an hour or so.)
4. Finish editing cwyln's Moya and Michael's novel.

While there are lots of other things that I also should do (like give away all the "work" clothes that I no longer wear), if I can do those four things I probably could change my life for the better.

This is not what I always envisioned my retirement would be. LIving across the hall from my 85-year-old mother so that I can take care of her might be a noble thing to do, but it doesn't allow for my life as I would like it to be. And, given that I don't believe in reincarnation or heaven, this is the only life that I'll ever have. If I choose to play caregiver and do something good for someone else, I need to figure out how to also generate the kind of excitement and stimulation in my life that I always managed to generate before. I need input so that I can again have some creative output.

OK. Emily Dickenson managed to be creative within the confines of some very narrow personal space. Nope, that's not me. I need to engage with a larger world. I hope that there will be still time for me to do that.

Here's hoping for new life in my New Year.