Sayonara 2009!

Go back to bloody hell where you came from, you son of a bit–

Wait a minute.

Might this be a half-full, half-empty glass-type thing?

Let’s see.

Half-empty: Five weeks of the most intense pressure of my working life, those first weeks of January. Then, three weeks hospitalized. Is it cancer? Exploratory surgery. Risky surgeries. Tube in my lung for two weeks. Recuperation. Lawyers say I can’t get a dime from a previous complication. Another surgery at another hospital. Work farms out my job while I’m out, and lays me off. No one’s hiring. Paste on a smile and fake enthusiasm for headhunters. Online resume graveyards. $100 for 140 letters and resumes and stamps nets one interview – overqualified. Still short of breath. Heavy and omnipresent depression.

Half-full: Goodbye four-boss CYA hell! Small but adequate severance package. Bonding with the Little One at parks and museums and with Stretch the Silly Man. Reconnecting with old friends via FB. Becoming a Eucharistic Minister. Watching Patch develop from a helpless baby to a toddler exploring her world and struggling to communicate with me. Walking the Little One to kindergarten and back every day. A Confederacy of Dunces, The Man Who Fell to Earth, Silence, Kim, She, and George R. R. Martin. Expanding the Hopper site. SBI and the other websites, still in partial development. A Man on the Moon. Hopper Consulting. No beer or booze in 330 days.

I think a better way of looking at 2009, for me, is that God is working here, somewhere in the background. The work isn’t done, and though He’s flashing billboards at me, I’m too tunnel-visioned to decipher the message.

But I’m going to spend a good deal of 2010 trying to expand my line of sight.

Two main resolutions for midnight tonight: Health and Income. I did a spreadsheet a few days ago with a bunch of bullet points under each. As far as the Health category goes, its all about making about a dozen things habitual. As far as Income is concerned, its all about completing about a dozen projects. What I dig is that they’re symbiotic; improve one and the other gets better, too. The healthier I am, the more energy and enthusiasm I have to get those income projects done. And the more I get done, the better I feel, the better I want to take care of myself. You get the drift.

I truly wish everyone a safe and fantabulistic New Years Eve! Don’t drink too much so you can get those resolutions off right tomorrow morning!