Resolve, Not Just for Dirty Carpets

2011. A New Year. A new decade. A new cycle.

People lose their shit over it. It's a marker, symbolic of a new phase in our lives. Another twelve months to make ourselves better human beings. A time to reassess our lives and years gone by to make a positive change. Get rid of that ratty old beat up you in exchange for a bright, shiny new you.

We just eat it up. We see gimmicks for a "NEW YEAR, NEW YOU!" A "NEW START ON YOUR LIFE!" A "NEW YEAR FOR A NEW LIFE!" We just see these all capped statements as a sort of chant, a mantra; Newer is Better.

Which leads us to my most hated American tradition; New Year's Resolutions.

Resolutions are evil. They set us up for failure. In our eagerness for change and in a haze from all this positive, power changing brainwashing, we convince ourselves to make resolutions that are impossible. "I'll lose 50 pounds!" "I'll find the one!" "I'll quit my crappy job and find my dream job!" Year in and year out, we set ourselves up for failure. So come December 31st, we look back and realize instead of losing 50 pounds you gained 60, you had a 6 month relationship that crashed and burned faster than the Hindenburg, and you're still working your crappy, dead-end job. And that is why come New Year's Eve we drink ourselves into drunken stupors. Because we don't focus on all the small success of the past year, but all the huge failures we set ourselves up for. The promises we broke to ourselves. Then after our hangovers on January 1st, we get caught up in the rah rah rah of the New Year, just to repeat the cycle.

And I'm always perplexed with this newness obsession people have this time of year. That new shiny you is just not as beautiful and intelligent as that old ratty you. That old ratty you made mistakes, had experiences, lived life. You got scars and wrinkles, stretch marks and pounds. There's a story behind all of those. Not to say you shouldn't change, but why are people always so willing to just sluff off the old in exchange for the new? Working toward a better future means making positive changes based off what you've learned. Not just saying, hey! It's a new year, let's just start over, clean slate!

Now don't get me wrong. I'm a goal oriented person. But the first thing you have to know about goals is that they have to be reasonable abd should stem off things you've learned about yourself and your enviornment. Things you know you can actually accomplish.

And that brings us to my not so typical 2011 Resolutions:

1) I will not become morbidly obese. I will not bring home buckets of KFC and gravy, 5 2 liters of Pepsi Cola and gallons of Chocolate ice cream just for my dinner. I will not need a crane to lift me from my bed to the toilet or a bulldozer to knock down my wall so I can be transported from my bed to the ER because of a heartattack brought on by my weight. I will not need a circus tent for my clothing.
2) I will not become a crack whore living off the streets and selling myself for some blow. I will not have a pimp to handle me and offer my wares to eager customers.
3) I will not become a stripper and change my name to Candi Sparkles.
4) I will not move back to my hometown and become bare foot and pregnant to spend the rest of my days living with a sometimes boyfriend who would rather go fishin' and huntin' then discuss the major themes of A Tale of Two Cities. Mostly because he's illiterate.
5) I will not get genital herpes, even though the people from those commercials do exciting things with their partners like kayak and go on picnics.
6) I will not adopt 5 cats and name them Mr. Darcy, Captain Wentworth, Marcus Flutie, Eric Northman and Phineas Tucker, and talk to them as if they were actual human men. I.e., I will not adopt 5 cats and name them after literary men that I wish were real to make me less lonely.
7) I will not buy skinny jeans and delude myself into thinking they make me look good or make me look skinny. Because they will do neither. Instead they would just accentuate my already rather larger ass and thighs, in which case it would be better the call them the definitely not skinny jeans.
8) I will not become a Hoarder, saving that one piece of paper because it was from that one night this one guy I thought was cute used it was a napkin and when he left I picked it up to remember how I almost could have married him.
9) I will not become Miss Havisham, jilted and closed off from the world and the chance to love again, perpetually looking at a clock that reads twenty to nine while outside the minutes tick away.
10) I will continue to write in this blog, submitting the world to my point of view and thoughts. (Pikachu, help you all)

So, there they are. 10 resolutions I am resolved to meet. And the great thing is come December 31st, 2011, I will not be drinking myself into stupidity because of my failure, but because of my outstanding success!

Or so I hope. Because I really don't want to become a morbidly obesese stripper/crack whore hoarder named Candi Sparkles who has genital herpes and wears skinny jeans, living back home with children whose father is an illiterate redneck, and 5 cats in a house where my clocks always says 8:40 am.