Resolved…

2022 Blew Chunks, I’ll Try to Do Better in 2023

I used to make resolutions for the new year back when I didn’t have such a dismal track record of keeping them. Today the practice of resolving to lose weight or drink less or be more focused on my dreams is littered with the myriad failures that leave the spirit busted and remind us that goals without true resolve exist to make you feel inadequate.

As I leave behind one of the worst years in my fifty-six year history behind and stumble into a different but possibly similar year, I’ve decided to make some of those elusive resolutions and hope that they stick. Hope is a thing with feathers and mine this holiday looks a bit like a scraggly chicken, one eye pecked out and a mangy rash on its neck, desperately foraging for seed amongst the rubble.

It is, however, hope. After a year that left my self esteem almost tapped out and my ability to trust… well, anyone emaciated and crushed, a smidge of optimism is required. Making resolutions for a coming year is nothing if not stupidly optimistic and optimism, like the plant in Wall•E, must be nurtured.

Thus, for the 23rd year of the Millennium, I hereby resolve:

- I will save money that will stay in a vault only to be opened by me and without accommodation for any potential partner who may come along. This money will be squirreled away for the next leg of the journey.

- I will avoid discussion of politics or engage any attractive woman whilst drinking rye whiskey. Rye makes me cry watching things like CSI: Vegas so it does not make a solid accompaniment to either sharp thinking or brilliant pick-up lines.

- I’ll stop asking random people how old they think I am because that shit is as old as I am.

- I will publish “I Didn’t Marry a Prostitute” and then cease any discourse involving that sordid past. If someone asks about my third ex-wife, I’ll lie and tell them she died in Vegas and that I am a widower (which is true in a sense on both levels). If someone has read about the true story, I’ll let what is written tell the tale. “Buy the book,” I’ll say.

- I will limit the age range of women I may date to 50-65. I will seek out only those with naturally grey hair. I will aggressively avoid women who see sex as a weapon of empowerment. Basically, I will not date.

- I will not eat for pleasure but for fuel (except on holidays because, otherwise, what’s the freaking point?)

- I will enjoy a new apartment and embrace Kansas as a temporary but viable home base as I continue to help my family as dialysis and cancer is as common as the evening news.

- I will spend less time concerned about the behavior of people I will never meet and policies I will never have much affect upon and more time hunkering down to create the kind of artistic expression that feeds my wellbeing while making a living doing something else. This, of all these resolutions, will prove the most challenging.

- Yeah. I will lose some of that post-divorce weight.

- I will exorcise the industry jargon from my vocabulary. I recognize that people who routinely use words like ‘ideation’ and ‘synergistic’ are kind of douchey.

- I will do my level best to vent my opinion on cultural topics in writing rather than in conversation unless the conversation is that and not a debate. Also tough to follow-through.

I’m sure I’ll have more but that’s a good start. It’s also more than I expected to have but, you know, overachiever and all.

Have a great transition from one year to the next. Stay hydrated, take walks, and be careful who you marry.

Happy 2023!