looking forward – Deborah Makarios

No, it’s not December 31st just yet. (Did you give the calendar a panicky look?)

Tomorrow is St. Andrew’s Day (he’s the patron saint of Scotland) and also, this year, the first Sunday in Advent and therefore the first day of the new ecclesiastical year.
Question: why is it that people paint themselves green on St Patrick’s Day (even if they don’t have Irish blood) but they don’t paint themselves blue on St. Andrew’s Day, even if they’re Scots?
I mean, if you have an ancestral tradition of painting yourself blue, why not go for it?

I did actually paint myself blue once (although not on St. Andrew’s Day) with blue food colouring mixed into my sunscreen. I figured if it was safe to eat, it was probably safe to wear.
Rather disturbingly, though, it sank into my skin regardless of how many coats I put on, and I ended the day a pale silvery blue.
And then I leaked blue into my clothes for a week. Next time I might just rub myself with woad, or its nearest antipodean equivalent. (Tips?)

Anyway, regardless of what colour you are planning on being tomorrow, it’s the first day of Advent, the Season of Anticipation, when the church looks forward to celebrating Christ’s first coming, and remembers to anticipate his second. (N.B. If you are not looking forward to Christmas, try staying out of shops. It helps.) Advent is by its very nature a forward-looking time, and it can be useful for more than just preparing for Christmas.

You see, with traditional New Year’s Resolutions, the serious (in fact, crippling) downside is that you make them in the holidays, when everything’s out of routine. That’s the absolute last time that works for starting something new. If you start with the ecclesiastical new year, on the other hand, you get three to four weeks head start before the holidays whip the carpet from under your feet.

The other problem with the usual New Year’s Resolutions is that you don’t get any time to get yourself organized. You’re just plunged straight into the new year, everything’s closed, and by the time you’ve missed a day or a week or so, it seems a bit late for a fresh start that year.
Again, Advent to the rescue! Advent can be a time for getting things together, getting focused, and getting your head in the game. (Odd expression. There aren’t many games that are improved by sticking your head into the middle of things. Trust me.)

So, in the Adventular spirit of Looking Ahead, what’s coming up for you this year? Is there something you want to accomplish, something you want to quit, or any other kind of change to make?
Now, I know some people are staunchly anti-resolution, often because they know that resolutions seldom stick. I don’t make resolutions myself, for that very reason. Why make yourself more reasons to feel guilty?

But how about picking a theme for your year? The Year of Friendship, the Debt-Free Year, the Year of Moving On?
This year I’m going with a theme of Finishing Well. I have so many unfinished things in my life; so many projects from so many years ago, and some of them hang round my neck like millstones. So this will be my year of Finishing, and Finishing Well. Time to start planning how I’m going to make that happen.

What about you? What are you Looking Forward to this year?

Confession time: I didn’t think when this year began that I’d be able to withstand another year in the Dreaded Day Job. I cried, I begged, I pleaded, I fasted and prayed – and I stayed stuck. It was like fighting with the Tar-Baby – the more I fought the stucker I got (and like the Tar-Baby, He say nuthin’).

Twelve months on, and I’m still at the DDJ, and none of the myriad resignation letters I have composed in thought have yet been set to paper. (A question for any employment lawyers out there: what’s the legal status of an employee who sends in several different resignation letters in one envelope?) But the year has not been wasted.

During the year I have worked through Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way. (Although I did miss some exercises due to a bout of ~~zombieism~~ bronchitis and I did get a couple of months behind at one point.) This has involved fun things like starting a scrapbook, playing with bubbles and making a jester’s hat. Less enjoyably, there was the dire Week Without Reading. Never Again.

While I haven’t been exactly religious in my observance of the ‘basic tools’ of the Artist’s Way – morning pages and Artist’s Dates – I have used them, and found them useful. One of the best things about the Artist’s Way is that it’s adaptable – not everyone has to do it the same way. It’s alter-to-fit, not One Size Fits All (which it never does).

The exercises for Chapter 12 include restorative and expansive tasks like mending something (in my case a summer dress that I can now wear after 18 months in the mending pile) or repotting a plant. I have brought home Bob the Parlour Palm (named after my favourite Simpsons character) and am on the lookout for a larger pot for him.

In the meantime I shall remove the freesia bulbs which ended up in the same pot (long story) and give them a taste of the fridge. For some reason they sprout in autumn, bloom in winter and die off in spring. Are they hemispherically confused?
I dare to dream that bringing Bob home from the DDJ is just the beginning of the longed-for ritual of Cleaning Out The Desk.

I am becoming unstuck. (Not in the two-sandwiches-short-of-a-picnic way. I think.) I wouldn’t say that the Artist’s Way is the key to creative freedom and the solution to all your problems, but it’s helped me push the boundaries of what I thought possible in my life – and to my delight, some of the boundaries give. (Although they do need to be pushed pretty hard…)

I am glad I did the Artist’s Way, and perhaps someday I shall do it again. But for now, I’m going to look back with gladness – and look forward with hope.

Tag: looking forward

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