We're two weeks into 2015 and my Twitter and Facebook feeds are awash with New Year's Resolutions, Diets and Detoxes. My Pinterest feed has suggested 100 Ways to Organise my Socks (colour-coordinated, of course). How inspiring...
Or not. If there was a Scrooge equivalent for the January Get-Up-and-Go spirit that seems to have infected otherwise reasonable people, I'd be its poster girl. Happily. Complete with piles of chocolate and chaos and un-coordinated socks.
I can't bear New Year's Resolutions. Maybe because it smacks of effort. Or perhaps it's because it suggests there is something wrong, that whatever we are doing isn't good enough. There is a constant pressure to be better and happier and wealthier and more successful and and and. I find it exhausting (although that might also have something to do with the toddler full of snot fidgeting in bed with me all night).
Although I wouldn't claim my life (or me!) is perfect, I think there is something to be said for simply being content with what's already right in front of you. 2014 was good. It was fun. It was just fine. Can't I be happy with that? Stick with the fun, the just fine? Embrace a dopey-smiled sort of complacency instead of always striving to do better?
This year, therefore, I'm making Anti-Resolutions:
Or not. If there was a Scrooge equivalent for the January Get-Up-and-Go spirit that seems to have infected otherwise reasonable people, I'd be its poster girl. Happily. Complete with piles of chocolate and chaos and un-coordinated socks.
I can't bear New Year's Resolutions. Maybe because it smacks of effort. Or perhaps it's because it suggests there is something wrong, that whatever we are doing isn't good enough. There is a constant pressure to be better and happier and wealthier and more successful and and and. I find it exhausting (although that might also have something to do with the toddler full of snot fidgeting in bed with me all night).
Although I wouldn't claim my life (or me!) is perfect, I think there is something to be said for simply being content with what's already right in front of you. 2014 was good. It was fun. It was just fine. Can't I be happy with that? Stick with the fun, the just fine? Embrace a dopey-smiled sort of complacency instead of always striving to do better?
This year, therefore, I'm making Anti-Resolutions:
1. There will be no diets or detoxes, despite the extra pounds gained over the holidays. There will be more simple, delicious meals. Some of them will be healthy and nutritious. Some of them will contain cream or sugar or full-fat cheese, and always loveliness. Some will have come straight for the pizza place down the road.
2. There will be no attempts at super-parenting, despite the toddler tantrums, the tiredness, the wee on the floor as we continue on our very messy toilet learning journey (a post on that to follow later this year - isn't that something to look forward to!). The door will still be firmly shut to all manner of parenting guides by those who don't know us. We will still bin any article containing the words "must-have" or "guaranteed to work", burn those that dare mention "baby" and "sleep" in the same line.
3. There will be no inspirational quotes or missions to Be More Mindful. Just Muddling Along As Is: adequate mother, preoccupied wife, mostly-failing friend. Dreadful housekeeper, avid crocheter, semi-successful translator. Reasonable cook. Maker of Toy Buses. And that's all, because that's quite a lot already and will just have to be good enough.
4. There will be no bucket lists or Grand Plans, because all I can think of when I see one of them is "oh God, not another to-do list". We had three long-haul flights in 2013 and another two in 2014 and, as much fun as we had once we were off the (goddamn) plane, I have no desire to test the limits of by sanity by constraining a two-year-old in a winged box of metal for twelve hours again. Possibly ever. For as long as Italy remains our home, I'd rather just get up on a Sunday morning and decide on the spot where the day will take us.
I like this list, my Anti-Resolutions.
There is just one snag to my Resolution not to be Resolved. It looks like this:
2. There will be no attempts at super-parenting, despite the toddler tantrums, the tiredness, the wee on the floor as we continue on our very messy toilet learning journey (a post on that to follow later this year - isn't that something to look forward to!). The door will still be firmly shut to all manner of parenting guides by those who don't know us. We will still bin any article containing the words "must-have" or "guaranteed to work", burn those that dare mention "baby" and "sleep" in the same line.
3. There will be no inspirational quotes or missions to Be More Mindful. Just Muddling Along As Is: adequate mother, preoccupied wife, mostly-failing friend. Dreadful housekeeper, avid crocheter, semi-successful translator. Reasonable cook. Maker of Toy Buses. And that's all, because that's quite a lot already and will just have to be good enough.
4. There will be no bucket lists or Grand Plans, because all I can think of when I see one of them is "oh God, not another to-do list". We had three long-haul flights in 2013 and another two in 2014 and, as much fun as we had once we were off the (goddamn) plane, I have no desire to test the limits of by sanity by constraining a two-year-old in a winged box of metal for twelve hours again. Possibly ever. For as long as Italy remains our home, I'd rather just get up on a Sunday morning and decide on the spot where the day will take us.
I like this list, my Anti-Resolutions.
There is just one snag to my Resolution not to be Resolved. It looks like this:
My Office/Craft Room and, it seems, our family's Dumping Ground.
Or actually, that's just one part of it. The truth, you see, is that the whole of our 60m2 flat is full. of. stuff.
Full of stuff that will be a pain in the backside when we, most likely, have to move later this year. Gah.
I have to do something about it both because of said move but also because it's driving me bonkers. I can't work with this pile of stuff next to me.
And so, kicking and screaming and utterly UNRESOLVED, I'm decluttering. I'm even trying to follow the Household Organization Diet by a blog called Clean and Scentscible:
Or actually, that's just one part of it. The truth, you see, is that the whole of our 60m2 flat is full. of. stuff.
Full of stuff that will be a pain in the backside when we, most likely, have to move later this year. Gah.
I have to do something about it both because of said move but also because it's driving me bonkers. I can't work with this pile of stuff next to me.
And so, kicking and screaming and utterly UNRESOLVED, I'm decluttering. I'm even trying to follow the Household Organization Diet by a blog called Clean and Scentscible:
I am, I promise you, shuddering as I write this. But it needs to be done and this plan (don't make me say the word 'diet') is so logical and well-put together that I can't not do it. So let's just stick with the word 'plan', file it under 'general prettifying' and 'pre-move prep', and continue being completely Anti-Resolution, shall we? Because, heaven forbid, it seems to be working:
My newly-prettified office Inspiration Wall
Come say hello:
