I have a life-long cycle of getting overloaded with commitments (especially around the holidays, of course) and then getting so stressed that I get through everything by shutting down, gritting my teeth, and surviving. Then when it's over, it takes a couple of weeks to recover.
In the past, I've tried to manage this by cutting back on commitments, but then I get bored and depressed. This year was definitely not a bored and depressed year. I think we had two evenings at home during the two weeks before Christmas. I was completely brain dead by Christmas day. I'm starting to think that I just need to accept that this is my normal cycle, and I should figure out how to manage it instead of trying to change it. It's not like this is a surprise--the holidays are busy and stressful for everyone.
For me, managing holiday stress for sure means scheduling time off after Christmas, and this year we were able to do that. I was totally on auto-pilot by the time Christmas rolled around, but during our week of vacation I could feel myself coming back to life. We had a great time with our kids and their partners, played a lot of cards, watched a lot of football/golf/movies, and walked on the beach. Can't ask for much more from a vacation.
I also got some reading done-- wouldn't be a good vacation without a stack of books-- including one more five-star read for 2019, Tuesday Mooney Talks to Ghosts. The title makes complete sense once you've read the book, but I think it's also misleading.
There is a ghost, sort of, but it's not really a ghost story, and it's certainly not a horror book. The blurb also mentions a treasure hunt, and although there is a treasure hunt, it's not the focus of the story and really it only has two steps. A lot of the negative reviews are about people's disappointment on those two fronts. But if you want a story of a bunch of misfits who are dealing with grief and not fitting in with a major dose of snarkiness, it delivers in spades. I loved it.
So now it's 2020. I've told you before I don't do New Year's resolutions (because I always fail at them), but I do usually have a theme, and this year it is pay attention. I've done this before, and it's always just something that pops into my head during the first week of the new year. I don't bother defining it any more than the phrase, because part of the whole thing is figuring out what it means as the year goes by.
The other intention I set for myself this year is to start investigating how we can cut down on single-use plastic. I gave up on paper towels in one moment when I walked into the restroom at our local movie theater and noticed that there were more paper towels stuffed in the trash for that one night than we would use at our house in a couple of months. Maybe the whole year.
Cutting down on plastic is probably more important anyway. I quit buying bottled water three (four?) years ago (partly because PellMel lectured me about it--I love learning from my kids). I quit buying apples at Costo, where they come in a large, molded plastic clamshell. But I've never done much more than that. Up until last year, we could recycle plastic, so it didn't seem too horrible. But last year our county stopped taking plastic for recycling, and there are no other options for recycling in our community. So, will be working on this. Please share if you have any ideas.
Hope you survived the holidays with your sanity intact. My third intention for the year (start writing shorter blog posts) is apparently already shot to hell. Have a great day.
4 comments:
My new year's resolution is working toward using less plastic and eating more plants - less dairy and meat. For plastics, reusable grocery bags - have had these for years and just keep them in the car to grab and bring into any store; produce bags - I'm liking these, got them thru Amazon but got mom some at the local natural food store; I got shampoo and conditioner bars but since I previously bought the ginormous size shampoo and conditioner I can't give a review; and I've been (mostly) making my own yogurt and getting milk in glass bottles. Trying to remember to use jars instead of plastic bags. Rachel got me some beeswax wraps but I haven't used them yet. I've been carrying my own water bottle for years.
If you've got any good dinner recipes that are plant-based, let me know.
Oh, right, I forgot about shopping bags. I also have some favorites that I've been carrying for years. In fact, they're starting to wear out, I need to get some new ones. I also bought a bar of shampoo "soap" and haven't tried it yet! We will have to report back. Meatless meals-- see if your library has the Mark Bittman cookbook Food Matters, A Guide to Conscious Eating. He is a big advocate of cutting back on meat consumption but not necessarily cutting it out entirely. I've gotten lots of good ideas from him, and he's especially good with beans/legumes, which are my favorite version of meatless meals. More on this topic later.
Oh, oops-- "Food Matters" is a small book about his food philosophy. The big book with all the recipes is "The Food Matters Cookbook." They're both good, but there are way more recipes in the second one.
Thanks! I used the beeswax wraps for lunch the other day when I was attending an all day workshop. They work just fine although they do smell of honey. I couldn't tell if my sandwich tasted of honey or if it was just that I was smelling it. But my grapes were just grapes, no honey there.
I'll look up the cookbook. I'm in the NYT cooking group on FB and ideas come up there as well.
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