New Year's resolutions

I have a checkered history with New Year's resolutions. I go back and forth on them. This year, I continue to have the same goals I've had for a long while: finish a manuscript, fit into my jeans correctly (without buying new ones in larger sizes!), be a better (nicer, more understanding, more patient) person. But this year, I feel I want to add one - to be present and mindful, to enjoy, to really wallow in the pleasures of existence. I am surrounded by people and things and experiences that I love - from the first sleepy little hug I get when I wake Charles up for school to the blissful softness of my pillow when I lay my head on it at night - and I feel the need to be more aware of my blessings and less aware of those few minor things I have to complain about. (As you know, I'm a born complainer ... and with, really, very little reason. So I hope a side effect of all this bacchanalian joy in existence is to lessen the amount of complaints I feel the need to voice.)

So there you have it - work harder, live healthier, treat other people with more care, revel in all those things that bring me joy. And, lest all this be too much pressure, to remember these thoughts:

"Finish each day and be done with it. You have done what you could. Some blunders and absurdities no doubt crept in - forget them as soon as you can. Tomorrow is a new day: begin it well and serenely, and with too high a spirit to be cumbered with your old nonsense."
- Ralph Waldo Emerson