In 2019, I started the practice of choosing my own special WOTY, or Word of the Year. I heard about it on a podcast called Happiness with Gretchen Rubin. The idea is to choose a word or phrase as a personal theme, or goal, for the year—something to help you stay focused. In fact, that’s the word--focus—I choose for my very first WOTY back in 2019.
In 2020 I chose the word cultivate. It marked my first year of retirement, and I had so many creative and cultural projects I wanted to...well, cultivate. Of course, 2020 dealt us the pandemic with its lockdown and travel restrictions and constant uncertainty. I kept thinking, surely things will get better soon, but COVID-19 just kept on giving. Is it any wonder I chose hope for my 2021 WOTY?
Thinking about a WOTY for 2022 sent me down a few Internet rabbit holes. That’s how I discovered the American Dialect Society (ADS) has selected a WOTY for the English-speaking world every year since 1990. Granted, the ADS’s WOTY is different in that it’s selected after the fact, to sum up the preceding year in a word or phrase. Definitely, some of the ADS’s choices were telling. Here are some examples:
1992: Not!
1998: e- (as in e-mail or e-commerce)
1999: Y2K
2001: 9-11
2006: plutoed – (as in demoted or devalued, like what happened to my favorite planet, Pluto)
2008: bailout
2009: tweet
2015: singular they (as a gender-neutral pronoun)
2017: fake news
2021: insurrection
Isn’t it amazing how one little word can bring to mind so many memories of a time from the past?
I don’t kid myself for a minute that my WOTY list conveys anywhere near as much depth or history as the ADS’s—or Merriam-Webster’s, which began its own WOTY list in 2003, or Oxford University Press’s, which started a year later.
Still, I can’t seem to quit my list.
On Christmas Day 2021, I still hadn’t picked my word for 2022, even as I sat for three hours in WellStar’s Urgent Care waiting to test for Omicron. The latest variant had hit some family members just in time to ruin holiday plans, and, to be honest, I was pissed.
Yet as I sat in the WellStar waiting room, I also reminded myself I was fortunate...that I still got to celebrate the holiday with Rice...that the virus was quicker and gentler this round...that the frontline workers were kind and professional and healthy even as they, like COVID-19, just kept on giving. Sitting there reminded me that how I frame things matters, that I can add up my grievances and grouse, or I can count my blessings and savor them.
So here’s the thing. I've decided I'd best be re-framing like a mad woman about now.
And here's the other thing, in case you don't already know. My 2022 WOTY is lucky. What’s yours?
Cheers ~ Jan
It’s that most wonderful time of year again. For some. And, oh, how I envy the folks who love the holidays (aka Christmas for some but not all of you all). You know who you are, you souls who relish every tiny candy sprinkle of the season...every carol sung...every holiday party attended.
Cheers to you, my friends, who make the holidays glitter, by:
buying such a huge (and fresh!) Christmas tree that it’s neater and easier to saw it apart when the new year arrives rather than try to remove it whole.
wrapping gifts like it’s an Olympic sport for which you have no intention of winning anything less than a Gold.
gathering the multi-generation family in coordinated outfits for the holiday pic, which you get developed, printed, and sent as a holiday card before the ides of December.
organizing a family bake-off, complete with matching aprons, photographs and memories, and delicious goodies for everybody to take with them.
hosting an annual Christmas brunch, table spread with delectables and topped with decorated cake-pops, house sparkling with trees decked out in tribute to a love of Disney, wine, a White House visit, and I can’t remember what else!
planning a family surprise that includes a pre-holiday cruise followed by a trip to Disney and culminating back by the family tree on Christmas day.
Woo-hoo! And whew!
To all of you who do the holidays proud like that, please know this: I admire you and wish you glad tidings and blessings. I appreciate your sharing your zest for the season and hope you enjoy every well-deserved moment.
To my other friends—the ones more like me, okay?—who may have a little less spirit this time of year.... Well, hugs to us, too, even as we find ourselves:
wrapping gifts, if we exchange them at all, in plain brown paper or ready-made bags.
decorating when or however we can, with or without a tree, maybe with lights and ornaments, perhaps with just the stress of the season, because, hey, why not?
smiling for pictures—maybe a selfie?—even if the whole family won’t be gathered and we may have to Photoshop someone(s) in.
gorging on store-bought goodies because we didn’t bake anything ourselves.
spatting over what to have and when to serve the holiday meal.
continuing to squabble over even sillier stuff—like the nutritional contents in popcorn—and growing frustrated enough to maybe even call our partner an ass.
planning for future holiday adventures, because, yes, it’s a stressful time, but what would life be without a little Christmas? (Or Festivus, Kwanzaa, or Boxing Day?)
Regardless of how or what you’re celebrating this December—whether you’re an elf who can’t get enough, a Grinch who can’t get away fast enough, or someone who falls in between and likes just enough—happy holidays!
Cheers ~ J
‘Tis the last day of August, and I can’t help but think: Good riddance, Month No. 8! I don’t think I’ll miss you.
Truth is, in recent years August has come to bog me down with its air stagnant as dog breath, its gardens that wilt overnight, its lake water hot as a bath.... I could go on, but it’s probably obvious already. The “in-between-seasons” blues hits me hard this time of year. Every year.
But August also happens to be “Happiness Happens Month!” So on that note, here are a couple lessons I've learned, or reconfirmed, during August. Some have made me happy. Others have just made me think. In either case, here you have 'em.
About the seasons: The seasons (and months) don’t just change with the weather, they change with our lives. August is a prime example.
As a kid, I loved August. Yes, it was hot and humid even back then, even up north in my native Michigan. But back in the day, school didn’t start until after Labor Day. August meant days at the lake. Nights to hang out. Time to wind down before back-to-school time hit. August was good.
Later, as a parent of school-aged children living in the South, I was surprised to learn back-to-school time didn't mean September but rather August. It was soooo early for the poor kids. But lucky mom. August became my second chance at a new year, a season to start with a clean slate once again. Equally important, August provided a chance to catch a breath before life really got busy, as in the HalloThanksChristmas season.
But August looks different in the grandparent season of life. I find myself happy but sorrowful as the grands return to school, their sports teams forming, their days less leisurely. They can no longer prioritize coming over for pool time or spending a day at the lake. That doesn't make me happy.
If I take an even deeper dive into this season of my life, August is one more marker of so many things I haven’t accomplished, like traveling to Scotland, finishing my work-in-progress, landing a literary agent, and marking all fifty states off my list of places I have been. Diving even deeper, if I get out of myself and plunge into the cavern of others’ lives, August reminds me there are loved ones of kids no longer with us (think Sandy Hook Elementary or Stoneman Douglas High School, just for two examples). Those folks truly have reason to mourn this bittersweet month.
Indeed, the seasons don’t just change with the weather. They often change on a dime. Much the way that life does.
About science and medicine. This past August has brought into focus medical miracles that continue to transform my life. I continue to be grateful and awed. And, no, I’m not talking about COVID vaccines, although they do fall into this category.
There are other medical wonders, besides the development of vaccines, that have transpired in the last seventy years or less. Specifically, I’m thinking about organ donation and transplant. The first successful kidney transplant occurred in the 1950s. Successful liver, heart, and pancreas transplants occurred in the late 1960s, and lung and intestinal transplants followed in the 1980s. Why do I care? Probably because my sister Lisa (below right) is alive today because my sister Tina (below left) bravely donated a kidney to her back in 2001.
Two other young women very special to me are facing a similar journey in the coming months of 2021. Needless to say I’m grateful for the advances in science and medicine throughout the years.
You likely have similar stories of medical miracles that have touched you. What about that sweet friend who’s battling cancer? Or the loved one struggling with mental health issues? Advances in science and medicine increase their chances for a positive outcome. A medical miracle touched my life yesterday when my husband had his left retina re-attached. Chances are he’ll regain at least 90% of the vision he’s lost. That’s the bomb. So I’m grateful for so many things. Advances in technology. Gifted doctors. Prayer. Good mojo. Positive outcomes are never guaranteed, but this August I’m reminded that miracles do happen.
About the garden. Oh, my, yes, Georgia gardens do get dry in August. (Dry, or plagued by floods, depending on the year and the time of the month.) In past arid Augusts, I blamed my wilting garden on my work schedule and not being able to water early morning. I no longer have that excuse. But I also don’t have the onus of fretting we’ll starve if the garden fails to come through. In that case, we’ll just re-till and try again.
But you know what? Sometimes even dry gardens produce. And that makes me happy.
So here’s to August—the lessons it provides, the happiness (and sadness) it brings, the seasons of life it touches. I may not be all that sorry to see this August's passing, but I damn well hope to be around to usher it in again in 2022.
Cheers ~ J
