resolve

Shortly after making my new year's resolutions last year, I had a personal crisis following a night with a friend, two Germans, and a plate full of blow. The fallout, I think, really weakened my resolve, and to pull myself out of that shame spiral, I had to rely on the two bad habits I was trying to break with my resolutions: sugar and sloth.

That was back in a time when I wrote more prolifically in this blog, a time when my life was filled with spectacular failures--universally entertaining because they typically involved some combination of sex, drugs, and idiocy. Things are different now. I am still dealing with failure on a daily basis, but the failures are a lot less interesting and really only deal with some combination of writing, unemployment and monogamy. The lack of dramatic failure is a welcome change, but it also leaves me feeling a little stagnant; I am used to confrontation as a vehicle for change and growth.

Sometimes I can be really hard on myself and then things get pretty dark. I have to force myself out and talk myself up like a kindergarten teacher. I list off all my recent endeavors, and try to frame them as positive, even if they were failures. Failures are the best kinds of learning experiences. If I don't have a lot of endeavors to tick off to myself, well, that's the problem right there: Not Doing Shit. So I resolve to do more shit, whether it's starting some new project, however large or small, or tackling a big, bad habit.

But making the same resolution I've made for the past ten years (gonna finish my novel) has become more depressing than inspiring. I have to finish this and move on just so I can begin making some new resolutions.

Anyhow, I just wanted to tell you Happy New Year and that dammit, this is going to be the best fucking year ever. It's going to be hard to be last year, but it's off to an even better start. Instead of being sort of desperate and alone in Argentina, I'm calm and in love and in San Francisco. And tonight I'm making soup.