Enough of 2022; happy new year!

Life is rich and full here in Enoughsville, and this past week has been a precious bubble of time with family and friends, and also of time utterly and completely to myself.  I am very much aware of all the empirical studies that say that our deepest source of happiness rests on our relationships with others, and I also know how much I default to sitting by myself whenever I get the chance to do so, so this time of year is a bit of forced magic for my psyche.

One advantage of having so many different family members in so many places is that the celebrations of Christmas last for many days, instead of being the single focused day I remember from my childhood days.  I got to start the week with my dad, his wife, my sister and her husband, my guy, and Inkling.  

One of these people is good at turning
a "selfie" into an "us-ie". 

After a lovely Fitness Blender on Christmas morning with my sister followed by a warm shower, Inkling told me that my hair looked like a bird's nest, and she was absolutely correct, so I nabbed some birds from the nearby tree and added them to my head.  

There was an old gal with wet hair
who said, "it is just what I wear:
Two owls and a hen,
four larks and a wren
have all made their nest in my hair."
[apologies to Edward Lear]

Because I can, that's why.

After the time with my dad (et al) was over, we drove home and had another day or two of time with Gosling and her boyfriend Colin and his son.  I didn't take photos, but we constructed a kick-butt gingerbread house and had more good conversations . . . I really like the people my children have become as adults, I have to say.   

(I missed getting to see Kinderling and her kids; they've been beset by one illness after another recently, and I ache for them.  And my sons are both so, so far away: I got to have good conversations by phone or text with them, but I hope to find a way to visit with each of them in person in the coming month.)

In the days following Christmas -- in which the people of my church celebrate the long-ago birth of a man who walked on water -- I got to spend a bit of water-walking time with my young friend, the son of my colleague who passed away a year ago.  We found a depression in the park that had gotten first soggy, and then turned glassy when the cold front froze the ground and water that had collected there.  I called this spot "Lake George", but then my friend said it was too small for a lake, so we called it "Pond George" and spent a happy hour sliding back and forth, spinning, shuffling.  My sister and her husband are learning to skate (like, with real ice skates), so this made me think of the two of them, too, but really we were just goofing off and trying to get out some of the energy that needs to be burned off when you're 7 years old.  

Skating on Pond George.

Then my guy and Inkling went to New York, and left me alone [yayyyyyyyyyyyy]. Aside from skating on Pond George, I basically stayed home all by myself reading a book called "Mastering Community", and reveling in the paradox of what that sentence just said. The reason I tossed "basically" in there is because my running buddy June discovered how I was spending my days and balked: she urged me to go out to lunch with her and her family. Part of me wanted to stay home by myself, but I of course am well away of empirical studies that say don't-the-heck-stay-home-by-yourself-when-a-friend-wants-to-drag-you-into-society, so I obeyed. And then, after lunch, I went back home and read my book all by myself, and it was just a lovely, lovely set of days.

I am in a family of people who fanatically keep numerical track of things they've done over the year, and so here are some stats on what 2022 looked like for my fam.  First of all, Inkling is giddy with happiness about all the theater she's seen this year. 

51 distinct live shows (+ 4 virtual)
+ 18 repeats = 71 live performances.

Where some people go for quantity, I go for the opposite, so I'm very happy about the most recent record (for us) low entry on our Garbage Can Graph:

We put our garbage can at the curb 2 times in 2022.

Another happy set of low numbers:  I was in my car exactly 36 times this year, for a total of 1216 miles driven.  I am grateful for being in a place where I can walk and bike to almost everything!

I asked OfSnough what numbers he thought were most remarkable to him (he tracks books read, broken bones, countries traveled to, and more).  He said that what surprised him most is that this past year --- and probably the year before that, too --- his walking mileage was higher than his bike mileage:  2830 miles walked and only 2113 miles biked.  Go figure.

And that's a bit of a wrap up of the week and of the year in our neck of the woods, where we continue to be wealthy in our adventures.  May you and yours be similarly prosperous.