reverb11: S01E01

my friend,

i've already been able to put my word for 2012 into play with this first entry, but i'll get to that later.

at the end of 2010, celia suggested we make vision boards for the upcoming year - foam boards on which we glued and taped visual representations of the things, ideas and words that we'd like to see present in 2011. so, for this year, i chose the word CALM.

as one year changed into the next, i wanted to usher in a year where my heart, mind, soul and spirit had a soft place to land - and, to do that, i knew then that i would need to surround myself with calming elements. my vision board contained quotes and photos of traveling, the poetry of mary oliver & a vinyl record.

and it worked.

i began my 31st year by traveling solo for the first time in washington d.c. (thanks, jace!) and will undoubtedly end this year back at the very place i began: my grandparents' red-brick home; my home. from january to january, i've traveled to ten states and purchased plane tickets to spend a month backpacking overseas. from 2011 to 2012, i've found myself calmer than i can remember previously being, surrounded by amazing girlfriends, swimming in laughter & wine & happiness, lying under the stars in previously unexplored oases in my own home state and breathing deep what can only be called insatiable joy.

all day, between decorating my grey-walled cubicle with dollar tree's finest wrapping paper & garland, i've thought of what i want to manifest within my life for the pending new year. it wasn't until i sat down to write this post - worried that i was doing it wrong, that the words wouldn't sound right, that i'd bitten off more than i could chew with a 31-day commitment - that the word i was looking for wrote itself on me: RELINQUISH.

re·lin·quish [ri-ling-kwish]
1. to renounce or surrender (a possession, right, etc.): to relinquish the throne.
2. to give up; put aside or desist from: to relinquish a plan.
3. to let go; release: to relinquish one's hold.

do you remember that photo i sent you a few months ago, about letting go of one's fear one t-shirt & sock at a time? well, i am building my new year around that photo & this word.

as i stare into my as-of-yet determined future, i want to relinquish whatever expectations i have for it and instead concentrate on being here now & embracing whatever this crazy/beautiful life presents to me. as one of only a handful of people who truly know me, you are, i am sure, all-too familiar with my guilt complex, and this coming year, i hope to relinquish control of the things that i cannot change, should not change, yet still feel an almost debilitating responsibility toward. i cannot fix whatever is broken inside my mother, so i am releasing myself from that burden. i am surrendering all the prettily wrapped ideologies i have as to who i think i should be in god & in my faith and instead i chose to embrace him or her or they in those quiet, yet vast, places within me where i happen to know they still exist. i renounce the 12 years of stuff that pack my closets, gather cobwebs in the garage & hide in drawers that i no longer need or use or have all the parts for.

and, i suppose, above all else, i just give up. i offer up my cracks & faults & glories & beauty & humour & fear & joy & doubt & confidence & inhibitions & all my pre-packaged plans.