A (Belated) New Year & Air Freshener
Mental health issues are a bitch. I spent the majority of last year wallowing in a pit of self-doubt and anxiety. I was exhausted at the end of most days from presenting a confident I-am-normal-everything-is-fine persona all day at the office. BUT!
It’s a new year. Normally, I like to do what I call “The New Year Purge.” I clean the house and everything in it from top to bottom, and then comb out everything we don’t use or doesn’t fit or is broken. I take a load out to the dumpsters, a load off for donation, and begin the year fresh and free. However, 2026 started with illness. A lot of illness. Four days in, I got the flu, and just when I was feeling better, Jordan contracted it. Once Jordan was well, I got a stye in my eye. (I’d never in my life had a stye or pink eye or anything icky going on with my eyes, so I was more indignant than anything else. The staff at the clinic were very familiar with me at that point.) Absolutely nothing got done in January.
February is the official start of my new year. The New Year Purge still has not occurred, but I’ll get to it some Saturday I wake up early. The one thing I have done is embrace my resolutions. The first is:
“Just do it".”
The soap dispenser needs to be refilled? I don’t walk away; I fill the soap dispenser. The laundry hamper is full? I don’t let myself get immediately bogged down with the thought of the obligation to transfer things to the dryer and then fold everything; I put on a load of wash. I want to see a friend? I don’t second-guess about whether they want to hear from me or obsess over my wording; I text them. I see the pair of dragonfly earrings I haven’t worn in ages? I don’t tell myself that I need to wait until I’ve earned the right to wear them, that I don’t deserve to feel pretty; I put them on because, dammit, I wanted to wear them. I’ve scheduled appointments I’ve been putting off, made progress in sewing projects that got put to the side, and made plans with friends. My second resolution is:
“Read the books you already have, you compulsive book-buying crazy person.”
I bought myself a book counter for Christmas to entice myself to read more. I paused my Audible subscription and sorted all the audiobooks in my library I haven’t listened to yet into a separate folder. I created a to-be-read-first shelf on the windowsill by my armchair (I’m trying to read books that were gifts and that I’ve borrowed first). So far this year, zero books have been purchased and three books were completed:
“Treasure Island” by Robert Louis Stevenson - this one was an Audible dramatization
“Pirates and Prejudice” by Kara Louise - another audiobook recommended to me years ago
“Lovelight Farms” by B.K. Borison - the paperback pictured for this entry
It was actually part of “Lovelight Farms” that prompted me to post today. I finished reading it last night and today, as I was walking from the parking lot into the grocery, I saw a tattered, stained car air-freshener shaped like a pine tree on the ground. I took it as a sign. Pine tree car air fresheners are an inside joke between the two main characters in “Lovelight Farms,” so I got home and hopped on the computer. And I feel happy now. I didn’t stress over what I should write or the annoyance of altering photo formats. I just did it.
