2009 Musings

I realize, as I reluctantly schlep back here, that it's pretty pathetic to post Halloween photos almost a month later, at the end of November. Yikes. Sorry about that. It just seems that I've been neglecting this space--not for a lack of things to write about, but a lack of POSITIVE things to wax on about. And I don't want to be a "bitching blog." (Not to say I haven't bitched here. Far from it. Don't get my wrong: I'm a Class A Complainer. But if that's ALL I had to write about? Geez, painful.)

So I've been waiting, waiting, waiting, oh God, waiting for an upturn of sorts, something shiny and beautiful to offer forth here. Only it's really not arrived, this shiny, happy bit of something. It made writing my yearly Christmas letter a monumental feat of b.s.ing and hemming and hawing. We went to TENNESSEE, people! Wooo-hooo! We had a spate of family weddings, and we have more to "look forward to." (As my best friend commented, "You really were desperate for content to go that far. Let's look at what's coming in 2010 since nothing happened in 2009!")

Not that nothing happened in 2009. It's just not the sort of stuff you put in Christmas letters. The banking business bombed, making The Banker miserable. (The stuff runs downhill, they say, right back home to roost.) His one hope to find a new job in a better environment has gone nowhere. We have tried and repeatedly failed to add to our brood. The stuff of doctors and medicines and exhaustive medical visits are not Christmas letter fodder. Two loved ones decided to end their marriage. We had to get rid of one of our dogs. We have a 2-year-old who is funny and brilliant and headstrong--something to most assuredly be thankful for--but who continues to blatantly refuse to use the potty at home. At Mother's Day Out? REPEATEDLY. At home, where we can be comfortable and everyone loves us, well, that bulging, stinky diaper is just more to love, right? Exotic vacation plans were shelved. A long-time freelance client up and moved its operations to LA, effectively cutting its writers free. So...all things said, plenty occurred in 2009, just none of which I really want to repeat in a letter to loved ones, let alone here.

It's so much nicer to condense such fist-gnawing into one navel-gazing post, huh? (Before anyone clucks that things could have been so, so much worse, I absolutely agree. The Banker still has a job, albeit one that makes him a bear. We have an amazing daughter, and for her I thank God daily. We're housed and fed, warm and healthy. These are the big blessings, and I don't mean to undermine them. But we had many hopes and desires for this past year, and the gaping holes these unfulfilled dreams have left behind are truly painful.)

Still, there is this:


So here's to 2010. May it be better than 2009. May it be laughter-filled, love-renewing, family-gathering, and oh-so rewarding. Please, please, please.