2020 Vision

"Hindsight is 20/20" - Old Adage

In a few short hours, the calendar will turn a page on the decade. 2020 looms on the horizon.  Rather than make resolutions, I like to choose a theme for the coming year.  It provides me with a framework for my decisions and learning.  This year, 2019, was my year of saying "yes".  Unless I had a really good reason to say "no","yes" became my default response.  Of course, as Dr. Phil would say, no matter how flat you make a pancake, it always has two sides.  There have been times when the "yes" experience might have been better as a "no" experience but on balance, my year of saying "yes" was a resounding success.  Many of the highlights of my year came from saying yes to invitations to join friends on their adventures.  My favourite time of 2019 came early in the year when we accompanied our dear friends Tom and Denis on a Cuban holiday.  On one hot, sunny morning, Denis and I set up our easels and painted.  It was a magical morning spent with a man that I love as if he was my own brother.  Those hours alone, defined the wonder of our Cuban vacation.  Our time together was a gift that I gave to myself.

My 2020 theme is a bit of a departure from saying "yes" though I still intend to keep it as my default response.  I am deeming 2020 to be my year of remembering.  Not remembering events or experiences but rather, remembering me.  The last couple of years, I have been challenging many of my long held beliefs about who I am and what my limitations are.  And while some of those beliefs are true, I have found that many are not. It turns out that I am the domestic type.  I do have some artistic ability.  I'm not chickenhearted.  And now that I know what I'm not, I want to remember what I am - who I was before the world told me who I was and what I could and could not do.  2020 seems like exactly the right time to do that.  Hindsight with 20/20 vision in 2020.

Lest anyone should believe I am feeling lost - I am not.  I am strong, smart and courageous.  But there is much change in my life right now and many demands on my time and energy.  My husband is newly retired, my sisters are unwell and I have many health challenges of my own. And yet, as I enter the year when I will begin to collect my Old Age Pension, I feel that I am finally coming into my own. 

Resilient On the Eve of 64

"Will you still need me, will you still feed me, when I'm sixty-four" - The Beatles

Tomorrow marks the tenth anniversary since I began writing this blog and my 64th birthday.  I used to write in it quite frequently but a glance at my last entry shows me I have not written in it since January.   I guess I've been living in my head quite a lot.  I've been in my pre-birthday reflective period these past couple of weeks.  I've been trying to figure out a bunch of things - not just the direction of my future but also the truth of my past.   That is to say, I've been trying to get to the core of who I really am, free from the roles, confines and expectations that have been both self-imposed and imposed on me by others.  Becoming an orphan has been hard on me.  But after all the months of introspection, inside my grief and pain and even joy, I discovered one truth about myself.  I am resilient.

No matter what hand I get dealt, I have so far managed to play it the best way I know how and when I have to fold, I keep getting back into the game, no matter what.  I am resilient.  I have three times come back strong from critical illness.  I am resilient.  I have walked through hell and kept on walking because I am resilient.  I don't know why it took until 64 to figure it out but I'm awfully glad that I did.

The Colours of Me

I am a woman in pieces of colour.  In the prime of my life, the vibrancy of the rich reds and purples and greens caught the eyes of those around me.  A million shades of love.  A million shades of hope, of belief, of wonder, each piece shining in its own glorious way.  The colours of youth.  Pieces held tightly together in the sureness of my body and the clarity of my mind.  

I am not young anymore.  Pieces have shifted or crumbled away.  Pieces that used to shine in brilliant hues are missing now, colours faded into dark voids that hold the emptiness of lost loved ones, lost hopes, lost beauty.  Pieces whittled away and others added, not in blues and yellows but in the grayness of wires and steel.  The colours of my aging self no longer catch anyone’s eyes.  

I can no longer tell myself that I am middle aged.  In a couple of years, I will qualify for old age benefits.  My world is shifting and changing.  There will inevitably be more losses, less usefulness, less clarity. Pieces will continue to crumble.  Colours will continue to fade until I am invisible.