One Good Thing

some snaps and reflections

Happy New Year!

I don’t know about you, but I have a whopper of a headache – which has nothing to do with alcohol consumption and everything to do with sleeping on a foreign pillow last night.

And speaking of last night, I’m proud to say that I and my five other friends (who gathered here for Nerds’ NYE 2012) actually made it past midnight, primarily on account of being only partway through a ridiculous game of Pictionary. We turned on the TV three minutes before 12.00 am to see Kylie Minogue on stage in Sydney performing the countdown. We all waxed lyrical about how much we dislike Kylie Minogue, busted out the party poppers, then finished our game of Pictionary before shuffling off into the wee, dark hours of early morning in Toowoomba.

(You can survey evidence of our Pictionary game in the middle snap above: that’s John Howard, crafted by the expert illustrative hand of Helvadear.)

Earlier, we had pushed Mexican food around our plates on the verandah and attempted to make every off-colour pun imaginable. I didn’t even spill tomato on my white pussybow blouse, which, to me, is a fairly accurate indicator that I may have grown up just a little bit in the last year.

For some of us, 2012 was not a happy year. For me, it was the best of the last three. Of course, there are things that I hope for in the new year, personal things that I will not share here. But I’m grateful for the general upward trend in my life and for the special people in my sphere, too.

I’m only making two resolutions: 1. Be kinder to myself (no more saying ‘yuck’ when I look in the mirror; no more fretting about every mistake that I make for a fortnight at a time). 2. Stop working for free. Research, writing, and editing are my livelihood, not hobbies that I perform as a favour for anyone who asks.

Here are a couple of lessons that I learnt in 2012

1. You can never be too careful when applying bright red lipstick or reversing a vehicle.
2. ‘Social media’ is a misnomer.
3. Not everybody will like you, even if you’re pretty rad.
4. The confident prosper more easily than the good.
5. People are obsessed with their rights but often forget their responsibilities.
6. It’s always the wrong men who wear Speedos.
7. Apologies don’t mean much if behaviour doesn’t change.
8. Letting go is not giving up.
9. A muddy dog is a friendly dog.
10. If a cat starts retching on the edge of your bed, when you push the cat off your bed, they will vomit on both your bed and the floor.
11. It’s often more important to feel understood than it is to feel admired.
12. ‘Your love is on the grand scale; mine is in the detail.’
13. Honesty is refreshing.
14. If you give someone the impression at the start of a project that they can walk all over you, they will walk all over you.
15. You’ll always wish later that you had listened to your gut.
16. Attraction and compatibility are two very different things.
17. It’s difficult to change your own feelings; it’s almost impossible to change somebody else’s.
18. The postal system is not reliable.
19. It’s not worth working with people who cannot observe basic conventions of courtesy. ‘Busy’ is not a valid excuse for being an asshole.
20. Writing a list never ceases to feel satisfying.

Tagged with: 2012, new year, reflection

Categorised as: events+occasions, reviews+roundups+recaps, wisdom+philosophy