2025 is here. I don’t know about you, but I like to ease into the new year quietly. Sneak in while it’s distracted by fireworks and drunken revels and hope to go unnoticed for a little while. It seems the safest approach while still in recovery from whatever happened the previous year.

My husband and I usually welcome the new year by enjoying a quiet night at home. We tend to play games or watch movies. Delicious food and only a few drinks. I’ve become better behaved as I age and realised that it’s silly to start a new year with a hangover, so I try to avoid them. It does appear true, every year after 30 the hangover bites that little bit more.

Now a few days into the new year and I’ve returned to the office to continue my day job. My job keeps me out of trouble and most importantly, pays the bills so that I can write. It isn’t a job that I love, but being an adult also means understanding that you aren’t going to necessarily love your job. It doesn’t matter. I work with some truly wonderful people and that is the main thing.

Learning to write 2025 instead of 2024 is still taking a bit of practice. Part of me can’t believe it’s 2025. It feels so futuristic. Perhaps because I grew up watching TV shows where the wild and whacky technical exploits of the future (or post-apocalyptic wasteland, depending on what I was watching) were generally set around the 2020’s. I think back to the 90’s and it largely feels like yesterday. Heaven forbid I remember that it’s now a little over 20 years since I finished High School. Some memories will stick with you forever and seeing some people I’ve known since school reminds me of that. It doesn’t matter that we’ve gotten older, or for some, have kids of their own in high school. I still look at most of these people and can’t help seeing them as they were back when we were roaming the grounds at school.

Time marches on and doesn’t stop for any of us, no matter how me may wish it to at times. Looking in the mirror, there are a few more lines on my face and the grey hairs seem to be slowly multiplying. Once upon a time, finding a grey hair would have freaked me out. Eek, I’m getting old! Now, I look at the little markers of time as what they are. Markers of time. I am still here. Yup, little ol’ me has managed not to be knocked down by some of the harsh realities of life. I look at my hair now and smile, grateful. I am happy with my hairs turning grey. I will never be happy having a pluck a random hair out of my chin. And why is it that I always notice them when I am not at home and have no way to get rid of them, except for the futile attempts to tweeze them out with my generally short nails. If you ever notice a chin hair, please do me a favour and let me know about it. Like a stray seed stuck in the teeth or a skirt tucked into pants, I will always be grateful to know about it – and only moderately embarrassed.

New Years, seem very much like Birthdays. It tends to involve some introspection from people. Calendars end up marked with goals to lose weight and get fit (seems a popular goal for most people), be more spontaneous, finally go on that holiday that you’ve been putting off because it just hasn’t seemed like the “right” time. Nothing seems to spur us to action quite like the start of a new year or blowing out one extra candle on a birthday cake.

Side note: has anyone else always found it positively disgusting to blow on food that you are then expecting everyone to eat? Since I was young, I was always carefully watching the birthday person and trying to judge how much spittle would be landing on the cake and whether the cake looked yummy enough to ignore this. One of the few positives that came out of the Covid pandemic was the decrease in usage of birthday candles. I also dislike balloons for a similar reason…

This year, I certainly have plans for what I’d like to achieve but I absolutely refuse to call them resolutions. It seems that most resolutions are doomed to fail, and I would like to achieve my plans for the year.  In the grand scheme of things, I do not think my plans are really out there and overly ambitious.

They are:

1. Finish writing my latest draft of “Murphy’s Bluff”, which I hope to achieve quite soon.

2. Start the submissions process and hopefully find a nice home for my story. I do admit that I’ve grown quite protective of my story. It’s impossible not to. Blood, sweat, and tears are all mixed up within it and I do love walking around in my little town and believe that others would as well.

3. Re-carpet the bedrooms. We have some rather old and faded carpet in the bedrooms that has been driving me insane for a little while and is one of the last things on our list for renovations. This is the year. I can’t wait to be stepping out of bed on to lovely soft carpet.

4. Be more mindful of food and exercise. I am not making any plans for diets or a set weight that I’d like to drop. I’ve done that in the past and it gets old quick. Plus, the older I get, the harder it seems to drop the weight. But never mind that. I am happy and that’s the main thing. So, focusing on being more aware of the food I am eating, avoiding the processed food as much as possible (although I do love Mint Slice biscuits and lamingtons, and chocolate…) and being more regular with exercise seems the right way to go. I go on walks when the mood strikes me however usually exercise at home. I like my own environment and prefer to be close to my shower after a session of sweating it out.

5. More reading. This inclusion on the list will probably amuse those who know me. They may ask, how can you do MORE reading? I don’t think I read that much to be honest. Some weeks I get through more books than others. I have always been a voracious reader and am keen to discover new stories to fall in love with. I read most genres. As I figure it, my “to be read” pile is growing by the day and already easily fills a library. I am not going to be physically capable of reading every book that I want to. To be honest, there are some books I read more than once because I absolutely love them, and I know that this puts my TBR list back further, however reading should always be done for the joy of it, so I will not apologise for this.

I know. Not a crazy year I’ve got planned out. I am sure other things will pop up. I like to go with the flow a little bit. These are simply the plans I have for myself. I figure having too long a list tempts fate just a bit too much. Best to play it safe.

I am sure that although we would prefer otherwise, some horrible things will happen in 2025. It happens every year. I do limit the amount of news I am looking at; it isn’t great for my mental health to be bombarded by one heart breaking news story after another. I know I can’t bury my head in the sand. Terrible things will happen, whether we want them to or not. We can at least try to make the world a better place. Make the year a better year. I remember the small things I can do. Be polite to people, put rubbish in bins and not scatter it over the ground, don’t be in a rush to get everywhere that you drive around cutting everyone off in traffic. Simple little things that can add up to someone having a good day, instead of a horrible day.

I hope that you have a wonderful 2025. There may be challenges ahead however I hope that you are able to overcome them and see the good that exists in the world. I hope that you all smile more, and if you must cry, that they are tears from laughter.