The resolutions

New Year’s resolutions are the same for everyone; bad habits need to broken and good habits need to be formed. You’d think, after all my years of practice, swapping vice for virtue would be something I’d get better at. The problem, I think, is one of motivation. Moving the pieces around isn’t the hard part. Keeping them there is. Every year I claim this is the year that I keep it all together. And each year I have the evidence that I didn’t. The next year’s resolutions become even more grandiose to compensate for the failure of the year before and pretty soon it’s “discover a diamond mine and marry a movie star.” This year, my first resolution is to forget past failure. The less time I spend dwelling on the person I could have been, the better.

My other resolutions are:

Exercise more and in more ways. Take hikes, go roller skating, get off the treadmill and get out into the world.
Buy a bike and actually use it.
Eat more fruits and vegetables.
Read more non-fiction.
Try new things (restaurants, clubs, movies, events, parties)
Gather the strength to sever ties in unhealthy/stagnant relationships.
Walk the dogs more.
Floss more consistently.
Never open the second bottle of wine no matter how much you want to.
Keep the book club up and running.
Host more dinners.
Cook more meals than you eat out.
Smile at people; be more approachable.
Listen to lots of new music.
Volunteer more.
Eat mussels.
Finish your short stories, don’t just re-edit what you’ve written over and over.
Take up tennis again.

Okay, that’s it. I’ll give this a shot and see where it takes me.