New Year's Resolutions (Columbus post #1)

[Going to Columbus for the Wild Goose Creative New Year's Festival (henceforth to be known as the NYF for short) was like going to Harrisburg for Jeremiah and Dorothy's wedding in that there were a lot of post ideas that came out of it. That's why I'm using the same title format I did for the wedding, which I'm not done blogging about yet.]

When I was a kid, I used to try to make New Year's resolutions, just because everybody else did it and I thought maybe I should give it a try, too. I can't even remember one that I made, though, because my heart was never really in it. As I got older, this solidified into the thought that if something is worth doing, it's worth doing now. I don't store up resolutions for a calendar date.

In Columbus we made New Year's Resolution pendants, two small pieces of felt sewn together around a piece of paper on which you were encouraged to write a New Year's resolution. A lot of ideas for this were rattling around in my head, things I had already "resolved" to do before January 1. I went with the most traditional option, the one for which I most felt the need of a deadline.

Afterwards, as we were standing around before the next event, Morgan was asking people what their resolutions were and getting a little annoyed that most were responding that they couldn't tell him, as if they were birthday wishes. So much for accountability, he said.

We have a love/hate relationship with accountability. We know it's good for us, and sometimes we feel motivated by it. But on the other hand, what if we are feeling lazy and want to slack off? What if we declare an intention and fail to turn it into an accomplishment? What if, perhaps worst of all, we reveal something of our hearts and are laughed at, or looked down on?

Well, what if we do? The potential positives outweigh the potential negatives, don't they? Why live like we're in a Thomas Hardy novel, governed by "chance" that is always malicious?

On my slip of paper I wrote: "New Year's Resolution 2009: Pursue publication."

Feel free to check up on me.