Did I Keep My 2021 Resolutions?
2021 Resolutions
Read More. Write More. Get out in nature. Travel if I can.
#1. Read More
Did I read more in 2021? HA! Not as much as I did in 2019, but definitely more than 2020. You see, 2020 was the year I had many forms of depression. Especially because of the pandemic and the shut down. However, there were other factors contributing.
I honestly think I can count on one hand how many books I finished in 2020. 2021 started off that way as well. Picking up books, getting 1/4th to 1/2 of the way though, putting them down never to be touched again.
I did finish some books such as The Lost Apothecary by Sarah Penner, The Deep by Alma Katsu, The Shadows by Alex North, We Have Always Lived in The Castle by Shirley Jackson and a few others.
My mental health is returning and I feel so much more myself than I have in over a year. The last two books mentioned in that list were ones I finished in the last week of November. I am already over 100 pages into a new read. It’s one I started before, but never finished.
So by the end of 2021, I hope to have read close to 10 books. Anything over 5 would be great and would make me feel like I am making progress.
#2. Write More
I think I have written more this year than in 2020. I can’t remember if I started a potential novel last year or this year, but I worked on it more in the early months of 2021. I have gotten practically nowhere.
I have tried to participate in National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) every year, even though I give up within the first week. This year, I knew it wasn’t going to happen. I was busy working on a story submission for a job. I was planning to jump into NaNoWriMo afterwards and get a late start, but I came up with a story idea and I haven’t finished the core plot or characters yet. I want to get all the major details down first.
If I had to take a guess, I’d say I wrote less than 2020. Honestly, though, it’s probably the same.
#3. Get Out in Nature
In 2020, I was so sick of being stuck in my house by the end of the year, that I started to go on trails and to parks to walk on weekends. I even bought some hiking boots which work VERY well as snow boots. It was so invigorating. I wanted to do more of it.
If I am honest with myself, I always made plans with myself to go to the Nature Preserve 3 blocks away from my house every weekend and never did.
I did go back to the gym for a couple of weeks, though. That was until the worst part of my year and life happened. Which I will explain in the next part.
#4. Travel if I can
My dream job would be a travel writer/blogger/vlogger/agent. Anything with travel. I have always had a dormant wanderlust and it finally broke free a few years ago. However, my bank account said “HAHA, you’re crazy if you think you can afford it.”
We had saved to visit friends in Texas during 2020 and made the flight reservations about 2 weeks before the shutdown. So when that all happened, the airline gave us credit.
May 31st, also known as Memorial Day in the United States, my father passed away from the cause of the pandemic. It was the hardest thing I ever went through. My dad’s parents died when I was very young. My mother’s parents I wasn’t super close with so when they passed it was rough, but manageable. Plus, when people get older, you sort of prepare for it with each passing year.
The only other time where I was completely devastated to the point where I was just a walking shell of myself was in 2011 when a very close friend from high school committed suicide. He had called me about a week earlier to make plans for when he was up on leave (he was in the military) and also to talk through everything that happened to him recently. We stayed on the phone for hours and I thought he would be ok. Clearly, he wouldn’t be and I was not prepared at all for the news. It still hurts.
After my father died, I was a wreck. I was not myself and knew I wouldn’t be. I had daily mental battles with myself and I was on my way to be a walking shell again. I had to get away and reset.
I remembered that airline credit, called my friend in Texas, booked a flight, and was in Texas less than a month after my dad’s passing. It was so last minute, my friend was still working in the days I stayed there.
That not only reset me back to myself as much as it could (it would be months before I felt the way I feel now), but it also made me yearn for more traveling.
November was a hard month. My dad’s birthday was in November and Thanksgiving, too. A major family gathering holiday. So I knew I would need to get away for a little bit.
Cym and I made a trip to go to a small mountain town one weekend. It is definitely a tourist town and the worst thing was that the shops opened late and closed early. The best thing about it was the views and the company. It was an absolutely gorgeous town and it was a much needed vacation.
In conclusion, I did travel more than 2020, and I hope to travel more in the future.
What Now?
I will be working on setting resolutions for myself in 2022. I will probably make a posts about those at the end of the month. I wanted to make this post now because I didn’t post in November like I wanted to.
