Palaces of patience
Dec. 31st, 2019 12:00 pmBecause, as humans, we tend to start counting with "1" and not "0", 2020 is technically the last year of this decade and not the first year of a new decade. But because, as humans, we like seeing larger changes (like the two-digit shift from "19" to "20" and not the one-digit change from "20" to "21"), yeah, the end of the decade is upon us. It's like how tomatoes are a botanical fruit and a culinary vegetable, or how Pluto is now a generational thing.
Anyway. Left to my own devices, I generally don't go in for temporal landmarks, because no matter how you slice them they're all arbitrary. Plus, New Year's stuff tends to come burdened with a whole lot of cultural baggage that I don't find awfully conducive to how I want to live my life.
At the same time, the sheer weight of that cultural baggage makes it hard to ignore, and it ends up taking on a kind of significance beyond my ability to sweep away, so I feel like I should mark it in some way.
So here's what I'll say: the past decade has been an awfully weird one. I've had a lot of challenges, a lot of failures, and a lot of triumphs. Most of the things I thought I'd manage, I didn't; most of the things I have managed, I would never have imagined. I'm in a good place now and I don't have any desire to leave it in the immediate future, but I also don't think I want to stay here forever, and that's okay. I've learned a lot, I've grown a lot, and I've taught a lot, and long may that continue.
And, as per most years, I'm going back to re-memorize Richard Wilbur's poem, Year's End. Despite the fact that there is no snow here.
Anyway. Left to my own devices, I generally don't go in for temporal landmarks, because no matter how you slice them they're all arbitrary. Plus, New Year's stuff tends to come burdened with a whole lot of cultural baggage that I don't find awfully conducive to how I want to live my life.
At the same time, the sheer weight of that cultural baggage makes it hard to ignore, and it ends up taking on a kind of significance beyond my ability to sweep away, so I feel like I should mark it in some way.
So here's what I'll say: the past decade has been an awfully weird one. I've had a lot of challenges, a lot of failures, and a lot of triumphs. Most of the things I thought I'd manage, I didn't; most of the things I have managed, I would never have imagined. I'm in a good place now and I don't have any desire to leave it in the immediate future, but I also don't think I want to stay here forever, and that's okay. I've learned a lot, I've grown a lot, and I've taught a lot, and long may that continue.
And, as per most years, I'm going back to re-memorize Richard Wilbur's poem, Year's End. Despite the fact that there is no snow here.