Free of Burden

I asked a friend if she makes new year’s resolutions. She said no – she likes to start each year free of burden. I like that. I would like to shake off some burdens. But I also like making resolutions as a way to reflect on what is important to me, and how that changes over time. Sometimes I don’t physically write them down and sometimes I don’t write them down until February. But earlier this fall, I composed a cocktail-fuelled list of resolutions with my boyfriend, and VL and I have been intermittently discussing our resolutions throughout December. Since they are more or less prepared in my mind at the calendar-appropriate time this year, here are some 2018 resolutions.

1. Read 52 books together with my boyfriend. He is a slightly more voracious reader than I so we agreed on a distribution of 31 to him, 21 to me. Inspired by a friend who writes down everything she reads, I propose we both keep a list.
2. Read the same book as my boyfriend for at least two books so we can have a few evenings of couple’s book club.
3. Make sure several books on the list are set in Cuba, which we have tentatively selected for a travel destination for either Christmas 2018 or February 2019.
4. Save up for a trip to Cuba together.
5. Learn lots about Cuba. I read somewhere awhile back that anticipating and planning a trip in advance actually makes you enjoy it more. I like the idea of integrating that anticipation and planning into activities like the books I read, the media I consume, etc.
6. Snowshoe and hike a bunch.
7. Climb a bunch.
8. Wear hats A BUNCH.
9. Floss at least 200 times. (Don’t lie – you don’t floss every day either). Possibly place a calendar in the bathroom and place a sticker on each day you floss. Inspired by a friend who did this every time she went for a run.
10. Get to know which hotel bars and lounges in Vancouver have the best cocktails, bartenders, wine list, gluten-free desserts, most comfortable seating, cosiest fireplaces, are most conveniently located next to other downtown locations I frequent (art galleries, various movie theatres, all kinds of theatres), etc.
11. Forge deeper relationships with some awesome people I’ve met in the past year.
12. Host a breakfast party and serve a variety of breakfast foods eaten around the world.
13. Host at least one night of an articles club.
14. Play Taboo more than once with a fun group of people.
15. Stop making to-do lists. This may read as ironic because it’s literally at the end of what might be perceived as a to-do list, but let me explain.

I am a to-do list addict. I got into the habit of carrying a small notebook with me everywhere I go, so I usually write the to-do list there instead of on my phone or a scrap piece of paper, etc. Usually when I look back at a completed notebook, it contains several to-do lists, but also random musings while traveling solo, hostel addresses, lists of restaurants I want to try in new cities, lists of people to invite to events that I’m hosting, and miscellaneous sketches. All of those things are in the notebook I just finished, but 95% of it is to-do lists. That’s a dangerous ratio.

In the last half of 2017, I’ve noticed myself defaulting to the to-do list as an unholy dictator of my time and energy. Many weekends go by where I check off a whole list of items with the theory that getting those things done will make me feel calm and organized, and free up my mental energy for other things. But my brain is fuzzy and uncooperative Monday morning. I never feel rested. I blame renting an apartment that needed renovations, but in the process of tackling that endless project, I believe my thinking accidentally got rewired. In any case, the to-do list is robbing me of joy.

When I re-read the original list of resolutions I made with my boyfriend, I did an emotional litmus test with each item. If it felt like a burden, I left it off the “official” list here. That doesn’t mean I won’t still do those things, but I don’t want to call them resolutions. If I feel any resistance to them, including them here would make it too much like a to-do list. In future years, I will probably make resolutions with more brain-expanding, nose-to grindstone, builds-character, and goal-oriented items. Not that some of these are not some of those. But these are the right items for the coming year.

Thus completes a list of 2018 resolutions free from burden. Yes, even the flossing one. I mean, there’s gonna be stickers!!

Small yellow birds

I’m so grateful for friendships because they are some evidence that I’m living right after all, at least some of the time, at least a little bit.
If you still want to be my friend, then I can’t be all bad, right?
If I was as terrible as I sometimes think I am then probably you would stop loving me, writing me back, inviting me to things.
You’re my still-a-good-person canary.

If it turns sour, are the canaries meant to cry out first?
I wouldn’t like to cage anyone.
Better to take flight than die if finding it hard to breathe.
But why not a warning song?

Some canaries have flown away.
Canaries that stopped inviting me to things, or now that I think on it, never really invited me to things in the first place.
Canaries that stopped writing me back though. Those exist.
Canaries that stopped loving me? Hard to say. Who am I to know what lies in the hearts of small yellow birds?

Fears of flown coops have me senselessly searching for early signs of distress.
I really do wish canaries would sing out in warning of toxic environments,
though if I too am a small yellow bird then I admit I’ve sometimes winged away.

Maybe canaries think it is kinder to take wing than risk startling with a cry.
Maybe canaries sang songs that I failed to hear.
Maybe canaries couldn’t get enough air to cry out.
Maybe canaries are flying just out of sight for a time.

Canary literature reveals that it is rare for female canaries to sing.
Most only chirp.

And here ends metaphor because we should resist biological determinism of human gender roles.
And canaries are small yellow birds about which I am ambivalent.
And friends are more than indicators of whether I am a good and worthy person.

I admire and cherish you, dear friend.
I am grateful for the joy you bring to my life.
I am invested in nurturing an ongoing relationship with you.

But I do implore you to sing out or at the very least, chirp at me, if ever our air becomes toxic.