THANKFUL FRIDAY

I’ve seen so many memes about the length of January and how it feels like the month that will never end. I mean, January sure has set a particular tone for the year by starting with a blizzard. Then we entered a chaotic period of governmental change immediately threatening people’s jobs. Oh, hey…did you hear about the tuberculosis outbreak happening over on the Kansas side of this city I live in? State line is a street, not a barrier and I’m four miles from that line. So masking up is a very reasonable thing to do while roaming the city. Yesterday, we witnessed a horrific plane/helicopter crash over the Potomac, killing everyone involved. Today, leaves us holding our breaths in anticipation of the next tragic thing. And maybe by tomorrow, everyone will be sighing with relief that January is finally over.

I don’t know if I will be one of those sighing with relief.

January is complicated. This month, named for the god of beginnings and transitions, was added to the Roman calendar sometime around 713 BC by King Numa Pompilius. At this time there was still much debate and speculation about how to create a calendar. The first of January didn’t become the first day of the year for another hundred years and of course this is just the Roman calendar. Don’t get me started on the Lunar Calendar, though in a quick research glance, I did note that Anglo-Saxons (White, English, “Christian”) are the only ones who do not celebrate the new year based on the new moon. We’ve also grasped tightly to the narrative of the month being a new beginning. January is National Healthy Weight Awareness Month, National Codependency Awareness Month, Veganuary, and many more self improvement awareness things.

I find the expectation to make great changes to be stressful.

Thirteen years ago, January was a month of great change for me that was not one of my choosing. It holds more weight now then it did previously. Some of the weight is pure terror of the unknown of illness. Though the time was terrifying, painful and so fucking sad, still it was the last month I had with Chris. In between the pain and terror there were moments of great sweetness. We laid next to each other, hands clasped, and talked about everything and nothing. We laughed so much even while crying. The illness had not taken Chris’s mind yet and we spent hours together, just the two of us, soaking up the time we had left. I can’t really sigh with relief at the ending of January because February is so much worse.

Michael and I had a date night last Saturday that was really a hold-over birthday celebration. For the last three years whenever Michael has asked me where I want to eat for my birthday, I always say Earl’s Premier . This never works out because of some reason or other. This year, I stomped my foot and pouted. This is how we ended up with reservations almost a week after my birthday. It was all worth it. We took my scooter charm into Tiffany’s to be repaired and had the most pleasant experience. Then I went to Anthropolgie to spend my gift card. Again, I had the most pleasant experience, which was a surprise for me because I was not feeling good in my skin. The sweater I purchased is so so pretty and the colors make me feel joy. I will be sad to not wear it year round. Then we went to Earl’s and had the most spectacular dining experience. Simple. Delicious. Fabulous. A lesson for next year: Do not attempt birthday celebrations on actual day of birth.

Psst….I’m planning on celebrating a month earlier…in Paris!

So on this very last day of this first month of a new year, I’d like to celebrate the good that is tucked away between the bad. I survived another year! I’m relatively healthy! I can still touch my toes and move my body around. My mother also celebrated another birthday this month and I feel lucky to still have her with us. I ate a dozen perfect little raw oysters. I now own a sweater that contains the colors of a dessert sunrise. Only the giant piles of snow left from clearing streets and sidewalks still remain. All the rest of the snow has finally melted this week. Olga, my sourdough starter, is still alive and kicking. I may attempt ciabatta again this weekend.

Tucked inside the bad of the month were warm soothing hugs, silly giggles, and fascinating stories. I have gratitude for this messy, but lovely month.

WHY DOES JANUARY EVEN EXIST?

Three of us braved the icy, snow crusted roads this morning to come into the office. I had no choice. I have service people in town right now to do preventative maintenance of some of our very most popular microscopy systems. Rescheduling would be a difficult option for all concerned. But honestly, I probably would have made the treacherous drive here any way because I have become the First Law of Motion. The act of getting ready to go in to work is the applied force this ball needs to start moving.

And this ball really needs to start moving.

But that’s the thing with January. It is the first month of the year and should feel like a month of possibilities and fresh starts. The reality is that the month of January is my old 1976 Buick Skylark that took three to twenty turns of the key to get the engine started. This is where you decided if you are a ‘glass half full’ or a ‘glass half empty’ kind of person. If you lean towards the half empty way of thinking, you might think that January is here to ruin all of your plans. Michael attempted to make reservations for my birthday dinner in two weeks and there was zero availability at my first two choices. That weekend kicks off Kansas City Restaurant Week and there is the potential for an important Chiefs football game on that day. When Michael asked me for another option, I said “just forget it.” Then four to six inches of snow got dumped on the city and there’s more coming on Friday, canceling plans I had made for my mother and sister to visit so we could celebrate my mom’s birthday. So it really feels like January is looking at me and saying “Hey…I get that you want to do things. I really do, but nope.”

January. Wrecking plans since 1976. Or 2012 (if I’m being generous).

The month of January is named after the Roman god, Janus, the god of new beginnings and transitions. Janus is not the god of good new beginnings or bad new beginnings. He is the god of just new beginnings and new beginnings of any kind requires some transitioning. Back in 2012, I did not see January as a month of new beginnings. It was a month of painful slogging tasks. It was a time of conditioning for a transition into a new beginning that was most definitely not a good new beginning. All Januarys since have been compared to this and treated with an expectation that January is going to be hard as fuck. But I so desperately want to see January with ‘glass half full’ eyes, so here goes.

What would a ‘glass half full’ person think about January’s shenanigans?

January is your therapist telling you that all those things that you want to do requires you to put in some work to do them. There’s no waking up to written manuscripts or finished marathons. Goals are not met by happenstance. You have to put in the work, but January is also forcing you to focus only on the things you can control. It’s going to throw all these obstacles or tests out there that you have no control over to train you both mentally and physically to focus on the things you can control. To a ‘half glass empty’ person, this looks like the bare minimum of activity, but ‘glass half full’ people know that looks are deceiving. The hardest pose in yoga looks like you’re doing nothing while doing nothing, but this doing nothing time allows for molecular level recovery for our bodies.

I can’t control the snow, but I am able bodied enough to shovel my driveway and dig my car out. I made it to work, but did concede to canceling my yoga class this evening (safety first). Plans are not ruined; they have just been rearranged to different dates and venues. Everything could be so much worse right now. January could be really making me do much harder things this year than just navigating snowy terrain and cold weather. Maybe I should give the month of January a new slogan.

January, the month that is the kick-you-in-the-ass trainer you didn’t know you needed.