The Incline to 2010

Amazing how much we shut down, mentally, over the last week of the year. Maybe 'shutting down' is the wrong word, because finally being free of my 'studies' as well as having a much lighter work load than usual has let me relax and play around a little bit. It almost feels like the closing days of December are the period where you get to remember who you are, and try to set priorities for the coming year.

And please note that by 'setting priorities,' I don't mean 'resolve.' The New Year's Resolution is a somewhat goofy tradition, essentially a joke with a punchline of twelve months of unused gym membership dues. To illustrate; my New Year's Resolution is to not eat any sweets for the month of January. Which I will easily achieve, unless I just plumb forget. No big deal either way. But the setting of priorities runs far deeper. That's the thing you must do, otherwise you forfeit a chunk of your soul, the size of said chunk being directly proportional to the importance of the decision.

I've definitely reached a point in my life where these decisions do carry a lot of importance, so you can imagine that the peril to my soul is steep. But the easiest of all these priorities will be to keep the Rambler going. Ever since its inception during a period of Olympic-Level Extreme Scheduling in my life (really, there's no other way to put it), this sometimes seemingly pointless little conclusion to my day has gained surprising purpose in my emotional makeup. Even on those days when you visit this space and read little more than a three word sentence saying that there won't be a Rambler on that day, that small parcel of time I've spent thinking about it has been oddly satisfying to me - allowing me to feel that I've accomplished something, however small, on those days where nothing else has quite gotten airborne.

I know what my priorities are for the year to come. And rest assured that you'll be reading about whatever pride, shame, anxiety and smugness that comes attached to them over the course of the next twelve months. But for now: take a breath, close your eyes, and remember who you are and why you came.

D.