Resolutions

I always make New Year's resolutions. From the time I was small I used the opportunity the new year brought to try to better myself. More recently I made two resolutions around the first of the year: one for me and one for the betterment of the world. For example, the resolutions might be to walk more and to pick up more litter. Or they might be to eat less ice cream and do one nice thing a day for others. This year, however, I have no resolution.

This year I can't wrap my brain around a resolution because I can't think far enough ahead to sustain such a commitment. In my grief, I am still operating day-to-day, hour-to-hour, sometimes minute-to-minute. Right now, to me, next week seems an impossibility.

Colby also had resolutions. Together, we thought about them over the holidays, and made careful choices. For many years we wrote our resolutions down and put them in the family bible. It's too painful, today, for me to look at them, but I remember several of his resolutions were to call his grandma daily, to read more, to take better care of his clothes, and for years he was able to keep his resolutions. For what are resolutions other than ways to build good habits? Once you do something every day for long enough you don't think so much about it, you just do it. And he did. More recently, though, it was a struggle for him to simply survive and that's where I am now.

Some days are better than others, but each day of grief still brings inordinate challenges in personal strength, optimism. Daily tasks that were once very easy have become very difficult. Going to the store, the post office, interacting with people, just getting up in the morning is sometimes nearly impossible. But I do all of it, each day hoping it will be easier than the last. So instead of a resolution I have a wish, that I just get through the year, day-by-day, hour-by-hour, minute-by-minute and that by next year I will be strong enough to have the resolve to make a positive addition or change to my life. I am not sure if this is a reasonable wish, if it is even possible, but it is a goal, something to strive toward and that in itself, is almost a resolution.