January 2 the time between christmess and new dears – a retrospective on ‘07

For me, the time between Christmess and New Dears has always
seemed like a bit of collective train wreck—part wasteland, part twilight zone,
part gluttony, part shop-a-mania, part forced family joyousness.

Added to this milieu is a flurry of pop-crapture programming
about New Year’s resolutions. It seems that every TV and radio show, newspaper,
magazine and online chats are preoccupied with celebrity resolutions, the most
popular resolutions, your resolutions, my resolutions, how to keep resolutions,
why resolutions aren’t kept . . . blah, blah, blah, blah . . .

Statistically, 98% of all New Year’s resolutions fail (45%
do so before the end of January) and so for the past quarter century, I’ve felt
smug for placing in the top two percentile among those trying to keep New
Years’ resolutions.

After a day of cross-country skiing, at the newly opened
2010 Winter Olympic Nordic facilities in the Callaghan Valley, I drove while my
beautiful, near-perfect partner and her sister dosed off. I listened as the
host of a CBC Radio show interviewed people about their New Years’ resolutions.
A woman from Louisiana recounted her story of giving up something different for
each month of the year—things such as, coffee, TV, mobile phones, movies, ice cream,
etc.

A strange light came on—no it wasn’t a light from all the
construction mayhem (improvements?) to the Sea to Sky Olympic highway—although
there were many of those too. It was one of those ah-ah moments when a brief
glimmer of clarity breaks through an otherwise foggy holiday haze. To my
surprise, horror and puzzlement, I decided to break my 25 year-old New Year’s
resolution by making a New Year’s resolution for ’08.

Inspired by that stranger from Louisiana, I too would
improve my odds at keeping my New Year’s resolution by switching resolutions
each month. Brilliant! But where to start?