I hope everyone had an excellent New Year's Eve! Casa Brillig had a fine evening, all doing what we wanted with the people we wanted to be doing it with. K1 was at a party with friends, K2 was playing Minecraft with our godsons and chatting on the phone with them the entire time, while Mr. Brillig and I watched TV while hanging with great friends in Second Life. Exciting, no. Enjoyable and a great way to end and begin a year, absolutely! This being the first day of 2015, I suppose we must consider what we have in front of us, so grab a bowl of split pea soup (with the bone from our Christmas ham flavoring the deliciousness, it's the perfect metaphor for carrying a bit of good from the old year into the new) and follow me below the leftover orange confetti after a word from our sponsor...
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Two years ago I wrote about New Year's Resolutions, and I can't say any better now than I did what my thoughts on them are:
So... New Year's Resolutions. For years I'd make them, then just as regularly break them days or weeks later. Resolutions to my brain feel like sworn oaths, a black or white declaration to the Universe that Something either will/won't be done/not done.
As with so many areas painted in great swaths of Black And White... it's too much. Impossible to achieve, because people, and lives, and worlds, are painted in shades of gray. Yet, as human beings striving to improve our lives I believe we need the ritual of the New Year's Resolution, as a way to say "Now I start again in my attempt to be a better me, or make a better world. The past is just that, the future is mine to write. Let's get going on it."
How to balance the need for marking the New Year while stopping the cycle of my failed Resolutions? I thought back to something I took part in at my UU church a year or two ago around Earth Day... in an effort to be more environmentally conscious, we were asked to choose one or more practices or changes to try, things such as using reuseable bags at the store or refillable drink bottles instead of plastic disposable ones, or giving up meat one day a week, etc. We weren't asked to commit to these practices or changes Forever-with-a-capital-F; instead, we were asked to commit to the goal of success for a little over a month.
Forever, I don't know about. Until next month, sure, I can do that! It felt manageable, less of a Major Life Change and more of an experiment. Which was, from all accounts including mine, a raging success. The followup on it for me was even nicer... the changes I made were by month's end as natural to me as breathing. And have carried on ever since.
So, instead of Resolutions today, I'm setting Goals. Resolutions are fragile things made to be broken... Goals are achievable in small steps, they don't have to be a BFD, and if you blow it one day there's always tomorrow to get back into the game and try again. Also, as anyone who's ever had to take part in the Employee Yearly Review process, goals are those things that are set but CAN BE MODIFIED if the situation changes.
Personal: To be more patient, and raise my voice less. I cringe thinking of the looks on my kids' faces when I yell, and I want to cause that look as little as possible.
Household: To get our clutter condition under control. Don't get me wrong, the house isn't going to appear on Hoarders anytime soon, but we do have a lot more stored here than we need, much of it the result of inertia. I want to make Casa Brillig a little less full and a lot more orderly, and I'm trying this strategy as a general basis. I dislike the condescension I get from the whole "FlyLady" system, and I know I have 15 minutes each day.
Community: My goal is to be more active in the wider community on issues that matter to me. We're starting a group at church to look at issues of race and privilege after our Dec. 14th #BlackLivesMatter service (one of these days I'll share how that went, as I delivered a short piece during the sermon on how the issue affects me) and I intend to be more active on that front. I also have set the goal of writing more stand-alone diaries here, so keep an eye out :-).
What are some of your goals for 2015? Personal, professional, health or fitness, social? And yes, "survive until 2016" is perfectly acceptable, in case you're wondering. For some of us, that is the ONLY goal worth setting.
My goal tonight is to extol the virtue of writing as a collaborative effort. Like the utterly wonderful BeninSC and I do for our TC endeavors :)
Brillig's ObDisclaimer: The decision to publish each nomination lies with the evening's Diarist and/or Comment Formatter. My evenings at the helm, I try reeeeallllyy hard to publish everything without regard to content. I really do, even when I disagree personally with any given nomination. "TopCommentness" lies in the eyes of the nominator and of you, the reader - I leave the decision to you. I do not publish self-nominations (ie your own comments) and if I ruled the world, we'd all build community, supporting and uplifting instead of tearing our fellow Kossacks down.
From liberaldad2:
This comment by Incredulousinusa was well written, insightful, and made me smile. Perfect way to start the year.
From belinda ridgewood:
In today's C!U!A! open thread, navajo's tip jar was a wonderful story about preserving culture, and itself had much topness. And then high uintas added a beautiful response that wrapped it up for the rest of us.
From BeninSC:
(I did not find these two until after TC posted last night, or they would have appeared then. Sadly they're no longer recommendable, but still worth reading. Please find a more current comment from each of the nominees and rec those!)
Posted by Liberal Thinking, the comment offers great information on green energy and building. In kos's absolutely magnificent series on energy efficiency and cost savings. Links to all of the diaries in the series may be found in any of them, even in yesterday's diary, on reducing heating and cooling costs. Don't miss it! Hotlist them all!
Steven D wrote an incredible, diary-length comment about the young transgender woman who committed suicide. It was so caring, so compassionate, so thoughtful, I am submitting it tonight anyway. From akadjian's fine diary on the matter. (At least two other diaries were written on it, including a very special one from rserven, here). Heartbreaking.)
aitchdee also responded to Steven D's comment, and said better than I have why it was great.
You are a wise and wonderful person, Steven D. You didn't add to the hurt, didn't lash out in retaliation in your own pain, and I admire and applaud you for it. I aim to do likewise in my own interpersonal transactions, on and off the blog, but I don't always succeed. You're a beautiful example to me.
Miss my village flagged this comment by Gooserock as 'comment of the year'. From DormantBlues' If A Woman Needs It, Should She Be Spanked?.
From Yours Truly, brillig:
I have a two-fer from 4CasandChlo, which I didn't realize til I was putting them in the diary tonite! First, from Dartagnan's Why Airlines Collude To Make Flying As Miserable As Possible comes this take on the system and win story. Then I noticed this gem in wvmcl's Two-year old kills mom at Wal-Mart - what is happening to our country?.
Top Mojo for Wednesday, December 31, 2014, first comments and tip jars excluded. Thank you
mik for the mojo magic! For those of you interested in How Top Mojo Works, please see his diary
FAQing Top Mojo.
1) The only waste... by cooper888 — 104
2) here is some background from Forbes by entlord — 78
3) See also: by rserven — 76
4) They think the harassment and intimidation... by markthshark — 70
5) I love that they presented actual demands by enhydra lutris — 69
6) And an eviction notice! by jpmassar — 66
7) Takings clause, 5th amendment: by rarely comments — 65
8) THIS is it by Mindful Nature — 65
9) The big deal on the parents' minds... by rserven — 61
10) Awesome...gorgeous...beautiful.... by smileycreek — 60
11) Happy New Year, your majesty! by ericlewis0 — 56
12) and this diary as well by Steven D — 54
13) Good riddance! by elwior — 54
14) I know one has to make by gchaucer2 — 53
15) Stay safe y'all!!! by karma5230 — 53
16) (or if else fails I'll just stand on your bladder) by jwinIL14 — 52
17) Buck's last year. by aoeu — 52
18) Please don't! by skohayes — 50
19) Let me try. by aoeu — 49
20) this is the moment when therapy becomes bunkum by annieli — 48
21) Well, they don't have to worry about Leelah by SphericalXS — 48
22) It didn't go to waste. by ThePhlebob — 47
23) This might have been by twigg — 47
24) Police itching to use violence to silence critics by Lefty Coaster — 47
25) When the local news first announced that a by bkamr — 44
26) Could it be that the tide is starting to turn by elwior — 43
27) I cried after reading her note by Pinto Pony — 42
28) excellent mark! how nice of you to take the time by Patriot Daily News Clearinghouse — 42
29) Happy New Year, PWB Peeps!ââ¢Â¥ by Ekaterin — 40
30) The deal Obama (and Reid) made was... by joe from Lowell — 40
31) :o) by Pam from Calif — 40
2015-1-1 Top Comments with Pictures, courtesy of
jotter!