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New Year Coming

I've spent most of my life in academia; the change of the calendar year has less import for me than for folk outside our very strange community.

It coincides with a break in the academic year, and there are the darkest-night-holidays that most cultures celebrate. Still it is not a new year (as I think of it) that begins for me tomorrow; I have classes, committee work, scholarship to do. It is ongoing from the past four months.

My family time has concluded as of this morning when I dropped my son off at the airport. We had other guests in town, and before that we had visited others. That family time has concluded and our lives will be quieter, for good and for bad.

I am in my office for the first full day in quite a while, and I am rotating between class preparation and my to-do list. I am gratified by each small accomplishment, as so much of my self-worth is tied in with what I accomplish, no matter how small.

During our family times the accomplishments I took most pride in were the meals that I cooked; I made some pretty good food for people. I grew up in a household where food preparation for holiday guests was a stressful time; there was much yelling and tears at times. I try to go the other way: let people know how much time I need for the kitchen, ask them their preferences of when and what, etc., and just calmly do the work. I try to make people enjoy the community with the food being a means to that end and not the end unto itself. Others can judge if I succeeded.

So 2025 starts tomorrow. I will need to remember to use it in the dates I write. I have a deep sorrow for the government my country has chosen but I am committing to neither obeying advance nor giving into fear in advance; if I have a New Year's resolution that would be it.


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