One of those End of the Year Reviews

So we've got the vast amount of food and preparation out of the way, all been jolly and glad to be us.  Now it's downhill to the New Year and January again, with all that self improvement calling us forwards.  For me I've got anniversaries to get through, times of the year when the sadness will envelope unbidden.  So I'm going to try and put some armour in place this year.  Get myself prepared so that I don't cause myself and others avoidable suffering.

I was looking up the definition of the word "pity" and came up with this:

'Pity originally means feeling for others, particularly feelings of sadness or sorrow, and was once used in a comparable sense to the more modern words "sympathy" and "empathy". Through insincere usage, it now has more unsympathetic connotations of feelings of superiority or condescension.'

Interesting that by pretending to be what you are not, you not only destroy your relationships, but also the language of those relationships.  I'm not just talking about my marriage, in fact that was quite far from my mind, more the friendships that have blossomed and died since.  It takes a good and steady heart to see a friendship as give and take, where both have space and most of all, respect.  Maybe this is why I have struggled with my friendships this year, my heart is still drifting rudderless as I fight to find who I am, which wave is mine to ride.  This makes me self-centred and unable to engage with others as they might like, but the true friend has seen that and is standing by, knowing that I am coming through.  Sadly there have been others who have pitied me, whether I have asked too much of them without giving enough in return, or whether they engaged me in friendship specificially because I was vulnerable and therefore could be used to support their puny core, I do not know.  It has been a hard lesson to learn, but one I truly hope I have properly learnt.

Writing this blog is very self-centred, but has been immensely useful.  To find that people have read and are engaging with the ideas that develop on this page is interesting.  It's almost as if in writing and offering those thoughts in a more permanent form rather than thinking, I am finding a way forward.  I have told myself the same things for sometime now, but the ideas seem to melt away, through the gratings as in the poem 'Rat's Tale', but that leaves me standing where I was, in pain and loss, which would make you pity me, and neither I nor my friends want that.

So, knowing that I am sometimes cheerful, sometimes beset by despair, sometimes run headlong into deeds of daring-do, yet at other times retreat terrified by everyday life, what am I glad happened in 2011?  A dozen things that I look back on and think, 'yup' that was good.  Here goes:

1. Meeting Paul at The Company Shed to claim my tenner
2. Giving into DN1's bullying and getting on Nemesis at Alton Towers.  She was right, I could do it and enjoy it.  Listening to her scream in terror then laugh maniacally beside me on the ride made me scream in pleasure
3. Buying my new car.  I loved the MX5 and how I felt in it, how it defined me and I was terrified of becoming 'Mummy Beyond Compare' if I went back to a sensible car, but you know it hasn't happened. 
4. Getting the coursework marked and passed by the moderator when my head of department went sick before he marked his work.  Without me 99 students would have failed their GCSE.
5. February 12th. No more detail than that, make it up if you need to know. Trust me, you won't be able to.
6. My holiday in Turkey.  Another singles holiday, but to switch off and laugh, without an agenda running, was truly liberating.  Yes, it was a shame there wasn't a gorgeous hunk to keep me occupied through the hot, lonely nights, but heck I caught up on much needed sleep.
7. Skydiving.  That moment when we'd stopped spinning out of the plane and I assumed the freefall position.  I expected to scream in terror until I laughed, as on Nemesis, but no, it was so much more awe-inspiring than that. The world is far too beautiful to scream at.
8. Buying the gas barbeque.  Another thing I was right about, but thanks to Gordon for tipping me off about where they were cheapest.
9. Sitting in the hot tub on a sunday morning with a cup of tea and a book, watching the rays of light streak across the sky in early dawn.  Has played havoc with my ironing routine, but given me the will keep going when the loneliness can try and overwhelm.
10. Listening to Ed Sheeran playing the Obelisk stage on saturday afternoon in the pouring rain at Latitude. 
11. Wine tasting evenings at the The Wine Shop in Great Horkesley.  Going it alone has been hard, but the kind people at the Wine Shop has always made me feel welcome, and I'm learning a) about wine b) I can have pleasure on my own despite being surrounded by couples.
12. Going to sing Vivaldi Gloria from scratch at Melford Church on Autumn Saturday.  Singing was always caught up with my former life, being a respectable member of Hadleigh Choral Society, and I found it hard to return when the lives of the rest of the choir seemed to be as before and mine had crashed and burned so inexplicably.  However, going somewhere I wasn't known, and knew no-one, I found such pleasure in singing, losing myself in the music again.  Part of the old me hasn't been lost, and shouldn't be.

Heck is that 12 already?  Can't be.  But there you are, 12 things I'm pleased I did.  I think I could probably rustle up another 12, but this will do.  Perhaps if and when the demons strike I shan't seek out pity and support, but realise I've always got another 12 things to remember than I was glad about.  Better get on with 2012 and find another dozen.  Won't take long.