Gary caught me working on this and when I told him it was a new blog post, he said, “Finally!” I had “resolutions” for 2024. Some of those plans fell apart and some went better than I dared hope and shifted my goals. Toward the end of the year I began making plans for 2025. Those have shifted too.

First, what happened?

• A second story of mine and two reviews were published by CALYX. [The CALYX published “A Single Fact Can Spoil a Good Argument” in 2006 and that short story became a novel.]
• We found a not-quite-local doctor in Portland, but might need to look again.
• I was given the great honor and pleasure of introducing the readers at the 20th anniversary of the Pacific University MFA program June residency.
• I sold handwoven shawls this year and wove more.
• Gary had robot-surgery to repair a hernia on 2 August. That went very badly, and he was not “well” for over four months. He’s pretty much fine now, but it was scary for both of us.
• For National Novel Writing Month (NaNo), I wrote thousands of new words, including a completely new draft of A SINGLE FACT. I haven’t got the ending right, but I’ve set up my submission information: query, pitch, synopsis, comparables, list of agents and small presses, etc.
• I joined a CALYX Art committee.
• I completed “Developmental Editing” of my novel in November, which involved two more drafts. I completed “Copyedits” for the fifth, sixth, and now a seven draft as I read it aloud, one chapter a time, to Gary. I will thank them properly in the Acknowledgements, but Molly Gloss, Ruth Gundle, and Gary got me through these drafts. I struggled and would like to think I would do better if there’s a next time. I am doing better.
• I read 52 books this year, my goal on Goodreads, including poetry collections, nonfiction, short stories, and novels. The books that stand out to me just now are nonfiction THE COST OF FREE LAND by Rebecca Clarren, science fiction THE AMERICAN WAR by Omar El Akkad, and memoir VIRGINIA’S APPLE by Judith Barrington. I’ve heard each of these authors read their work this year. If I were teaching, I’d teach all of Rebecca’s book, all of Omar’s, and at least some of Judith’s to my high school students. I’ve already gifted those books.
• I froze pesto and fire-roasted peppers, put up seven or eight batches of jam and chutney, wove several warps to fill my bins, and knit mittens.
• Gary and I traveled back and forth between the coast and Portland to spend XXX nights at our sweet little NW Portland condo.
• We are still considering how we will move forward.
• I walked XXX minutes, about XXX miles, and ran XXX miles. Gary walked while I ran and with me when I walked and sometimes on his own so about the same time and mileage.
• My running speed has slowed by nearly a minute each mile.
• We now have ten bookcases in Portland, but there are ten more at the coast plus stacks of books.
• We read newspapers and we voted and actually went inside local theaters twice to see two first-run movies, which wasn’t something I was sure I’d ever want to do again.

There were a great many things I meant to do in 2024, but haven’t. We need legal advice and we still have books to move east. There was supposed to be a garage sale that was overridden by Gary’s hernia. I meant to sew a dozen items as gifts that simply didn’t get made. I decided that editing my novel took priority over sending holiday cards, and I’m still struggling with that decision. I put on four pounds in recent weeks because I missed too many runs and I ate my own baking (which I allow for every year), and I even planned ahead to do things in 2025 that I’ve since decided don’t need to happen.

In 2024, I wrote fewer blog posts, revised a great many stories and started one or two new ones, but didn’t finish a single piece of new fiction.

I will take off the holiday pounds over the next weeks because I’ve done that for many years, and then I’ll decide whether to pursue an additional four- or eight-pound loss. [I am aware that it became much easier to move about after I dropped weight in 2020-2021, but I’m also aware that “lose weight” has been on my New Year’s Resolution lists most years since I was a teenager. I’m female and American—what more is there to explain? It can’t be healthy.]

Instead of piecing words, I might finally piece a quilt of my collected silks or of the Liberty cottons I’ve been stashing since I was an undergrad. Or I could knit the pink sweater—that yarn has been gathering too.

All this to say that I’ve revised the 2025 goals I’d been working on since last January!

• Find a lawyer.
• From Barbara: Do something meaningful for others. Forge ahead with purpose and stealth.
• Eat carefully and mindfully. More green.
• Set fiction writing aside; create something beautiful other than fiction.
• Post here on a regular schedule, even if it’s not often.
• Send cards early next winter.

My impulse is to either add a lot more goals to my list or not have any list at all. I will resist both those impulses. This is a manageable plan. I will, however, set another goal just for January: no purchases of anything but food. It is a relief to just say no.