Sometime around Thanksgiving, I shared a photo of the underside of a stone and promised to show you the other side. This is a gift I sent to a dear friend. Every time I see a heart, I think of her.
It’s been a quiet week but a good one for connecting with longtime friends by text, email, and phone. We’ve mostly gotten our Christmas stuff down and by tomorrow, it will all have been packed away. I hope to be asleep well before midnight, despite the fireworks that distress the dogs at Houndstooth Hall. I’ve never fully gotten my energy back since being sick in September/October, but other than fatigue, I feel pretty good at the end of another year.
One thing I feel positive about, as I look back, is that I managed to read seventy-six books this year, both fiction and nonfiction. After a prolonged reading dry spell the first two years of the pandemic, it feels promising to know I can once again give my attention to other people’s books. I’ve been a little concerned that I haven’t written much over the last quarter, and it occurred to me that my focus might have been another thing impacted by my health challenges.
Also in 2022, I did finish one novel and begin another. I’ve done three or four paintings on canvas; painted six ornaments I gave away; painted the wooden letters Aa to hang on the brick wall of Aaron’s Garden, and colored, I think, 36 projects–coloring pages, a bookmark, and an angel. I’ve written a few poems and sewn a few doll outfits, done a lot of organizing, donating, and purging from the Hall, and grown new plants and kept old ones alive. When I add it all up that way, I feel like I’ve been more creative than I realized over the past year.
Wishing you all a new year of good (or improving) health, satisfaction with the things you attempt or complete, abundance in all good things, serenity and energy as needed, and the gift of knowing what a wondrous creation you are, even when you don’t remember or believe it.
Much love and peace to you all.