Jaci Dawn

I have debated whether to write this morning and look back at the past year or to wait until tomorrow and start all over. 2018 was nothing short of a disaster for my personal goals, and – yet – it heralded a positive lifestyle change in the very last moments.

There were days when I felt I was in a black eddy, sucked into a whirlpool of mediocrity where all creativity, imagination, and desire was sucked out of me. I got up in the mornings, went through my paces, drank my coffee. The highlight of my weekdays was my ten o’clock and 3 o’clock breaks at work, when I’d wander down to a nearby duck pond and visit the semi-tame puddle ducks there. Occasionally, something interesting would happen on my walks (I did rescue some ducklings caught in a drain). More often than nought, those walks were times of prayer, meditation, and questioning.

The job was losing its luster. Good changes came in waves, but I felt no enthusiasm for them nor for the bright and shiny new tech tools that were dropped in front of our collective noses like carrots before the proverbial horse on a treadmill. I nibbled, but the taste seemed bland. The company offered carrots and I wanted apples and molasses-sweetened oats.

There were high points to the year, of course: my garden, the birds that fill our little 10,000 square feet haven of pesticide- and herbicide- free patch, the trip to South Dakota and home,  our exploration of the local brew pub culture. and our grandchildren and their parents coming for a long visit. The presence of our grandchildren pushed me toward being creative again: they begged to see and play with my little canvases of animals.

The ale caused me to gain weight.

The lowest point of the year was the loss of my father-in-law, a man so red-neck and boisterous that his loss sucked a hole in our universe. It’s hard to describe Sonny without describing all his shortcomings, but it was those very things that endeared him to us. Sonny’s life was construction, hunting, fishing, hunting, and fishing. Did I mention he loved to hunt and fish? One cannot think of Sonny without thinking of rifles, camo gear and fishing rods.

Emotionally, psychologically – the year was a cess-pool. I stepped carefully around my own illness, uninspired, tired, drained – it was as though I looked at my creative self and murmured, “Someday, I’ll rescue you, but for now, you stay locked in this tower room. I can’t help you, and you can’t help me.” I don’t even have the long hair to lower to a prince in disguise (nor did I sense there was a prince to come to my rescue).

I made the decision to jump out of the frying pan into ice cold water sometime before the fourth quarter of the year: I would retire at the end of 2018, putting to rest the anxiety of getting up every morning and doing work that didn’t benefit me in any other way except to put money in the coffers. It was a freeing decision. I applied for Social Security early and began counting down the days and hours. 2019 would be the first time in my life that I would have a little income coming in and a whole lot of time to myself (no small children) in which I could pursue my dreams. It wouldn’t be lot of money, but enough to help cover the bills and feed us.

The change came a tad bit earlier than I expected: my employer sent me home at 10AM on Friday with my last paycheck. I was retired.

So – what now? I’ve dinked around all weekend, itching to start my projects. My mind is aflutter with ideas. I’ve filled my Pinterest Boards with DIY projects. I’ve begun to reorganize the house (at least in my mind). I’m trying to take a four-day weekend before I jump in, but it’s very hard. That artist stuck in a tower seems to have discovered the secret entrance and a whole world is outside, beckoning that imprisoned creator into the open.

My next post will be the definition of the “what next?” – the hopes, dreams, and resolutions of a bird whose soul has been set free. I hope to start soaring.