Some thoughts for the New Year ...

Well, here it is ... the end of another year, but not only that --- the end of a decade.

And what a decade it's been!

Do you remember around this time, 10 years ago, what you were doing, and what was going on? I do.

I was 14 years old, a freshman in high school (and needless to say, about 50-60 lbs lighter). The Backstreet Boys and N*Sync were all the rage on MTV (which actually showed some music videos), boy band mania had gripped us teenybopper fangirls (okay, I'll admit ... Nick Carter was going to be my future husband. He didn't know that, but I was convinced of it), and the great Y2K dilemma had struck an uncertain fear into the hearts of the technologically-advanced world. Osama Bin Laden was hardly a blip on the radar for anyone, much less a household name (and not in a good way). I had no clue what the Twin Towers were, and couldn't give a flying crap WHAT happened in the Middle East. Knitting and crocheting were for little old ladies that had serious cat problems, gardening was something that only people that watched PBS did, and self-sufficiency and survivalism were for a bunch of redneck hicks that had militia meetings. I had a best friend with whom I was going to move to Florida (you know, because that's where Nick Carter and the Backstreet Boys were from) after graduating high school, we were going to get an apartment together, go to college together, and ---again --- both of us were convinced that, in one way or another, that life plan was going to ultimately end with us marrying our respective Backstreet Boy (there really was nothing other than THAT for us; we had a very finite range on our radar).

So, what's happened since then?

Well, I discovered that my idolization of Nick Carter didn't really pan out for me very well, and I moved on. I gained 50-60 lbs. September 11th, America's 2nd Pearl Harbor, rocked us all the way to our foundations. I became obsessed with various TV shows, some of which have since moved on without me, and some haven't (Smallville, Tarzan, Angel: The Series, Jericho, LOST, The Victory Garden, Colonial Home), as have their actors. I found new movies and their respective actors to fawn over (Red Eye - my favorite [Hel-LO! Cillian Murphy is gorgeous ... in that creepy sort of "I lurk in the shadows, watching you sleep at night, waiting for the perfect moment to slit your throat, all while maintaining a certain sexiness about my person" sort of way. Hmm ... I'm not over-analyzing, am I?], Batman Begins, The Dark Knight, Iron Man [Hel-LO Robert Downey, Jr., as well, even though he's old enough to be my dad], The Lord of the Rings Series, The Harry Potter Series). I took up crocheting, which then led to knitting once I found out that it really ISN'T just for old grannies anymore. Self-sufficiency and survivalism moved out of the tinfoil-hat/conspiracy theorists realm, and into the "it's just what people did during World War II on the American homefront" area. That sparked my interest in beginning my own little garden, which I hope to keep expanding upon each year, little by little, until --- before you know it --- it has taken over a large part of the back yard.

Now that we've covered that, what do I look forward to doing in the coming year?

• Well, for starters, I'm going to be an aunt again in March, then again in May. I have two older half-brothers who have kids, but they never really lived with us, so they're kind of distant. My two younger (full-blooded) sisters are each pregnant, and will be due at the beginning and middle of next year, respectively.
• Since I've got two new people that I'm going to have a higher likelihood of seeing that I'm going to be becoming an aunt to, I'm going to have to make baby blankets. And I haven't even started, yet. So, maybe I should get on that.
• I want to be able to play with my niece and ______ (my other sister doesn't find out what she's having until 12/29, so it's a wait-and-see game, though I'm guessing it's a boy, as does the rest of my family) when they're older, so I want to take off that 50-60 lbs that I've put on since high school, to start with. Then, when I make it there, since I was never thin in school, use that 50-60 lb weight-loss as a spring board into getting rid of the rest of my excess weight. Unfortunately, for my body size, age, and sex, I should weigh about 80 lbs less than what I actually do. I would LOVE to see how healthy I would feel weighing 80 lbs less! It just would open up so many new doors for me!
• Organization has never been my strong suit. Ever since I was little, I have had a chronically messy room. Now that I'm older, it just spills into the rest of my life --- a messy purse, a messy work desk, and messy car. I need to clean all that crap up. I wish I was more like Sookie Stackhouse, who cleans when she's bored. I'll need to switch from watching TV to fill my void, to cleaning.
• Speaking of Sookie, I need to finish those Southern Vampire Mysteries books.
• Now that I've completed my first season as a gardener, I've cleared my first hurdle. So, once January begins, I figure I'll only have about 4 or 5 months until I need to start setting my plants outside. It seems like a lot of time right now, but with my penchant for putting things off, it'll come up faster than I would ever imagine. I'll need to start getting together garden ideas and a list of what I want to grow next year, and where I'm going to put them.
• I've lost contact with a lot of "friends" since high school. I use the quotation marks, because I always wonder how great of a friend I was to those people if I never kept in touch with them, and vice versa. I should get back together with them.
• My work schedule has made it near to impossible to be able to attend recent 9/12 Project meetings. I loved going to them, and I'm going to start attending more, to become more involved.
• I'm absolutely sick with the way politicians on BOTH SIDES of the aisle have been running things within my own personal living memory, and I'm determined to HOLD EACH AND EVERY ONE OF THEM ACCOUNTABLE FOR THEIR ACTIONS! If they've sold us, the American people, out --- be it through national security, sweetheart deals, national sovereignty, illegal immigration, unconstitutional legislation, or any other action that breaks their oath of office to uphold and defend the Constitution of the United States of America --- then I will resolve to do everything in my power to educate myself and those around me as to what has been going on in Washington with our elected officials, and I will do everything I can to make sure that, come Election Day 2010, We The People will be handing them their pink slips. Don't let the door hit you in the ass on the way out, Congressman or Senator.

What about you guys? What are your resolutions for the New Year? Write a post on your own blog, and let's see what your grand plans are!