1. Savor every moment with my Peanut before she outgrows wanting to hang out with me. She says "I love you" to me and Mr. Fraulein all the time now. There is nothing like being loved by a 3-year-old!
2. Cut down my news consumption even more. If you had told me, back in the mid-90s when I was an actual member of the news media, that I would eventually stop reading newspapers and watching TV news altogether, I would have said you were insane. I still read a few blogs and lefty-leaning news sites but I think even that, I'm going to cut down on. This is because I now truly believe the thing I said for years I would never believe--that no politician of either party will ever truly effect positive change.
3. Try to do good, concretely. While can't do a goddamn thing about Iraq or Darfur, for example, I can do little things in my own community. I live in a fairly wealthy area where there are an increasing number of homeless, along with people with homes who can't afford both heating oil and food. So I can bring food to our local food pantry. I can volunteer when they serve meals. I can gather up clothes and coats and shoes we no longer use, and I can bring them there so they can give them out to people who have much less than we do. And I can try to reduce our family's energy footprint by bringing my own bags to the supermarket, replacing our old lightbulbs with the newer, more efficient ones, and simply trying not to buy more plastic crap than we truly need. Oh, and not driving too much, which we already do a pretty good job at.
4. Read more, eat healthier, drink red wine, see friends, get outside. Enjoy life. Enough said.
2 comments:
perfect goals and I am right there with you on all of them. We began the bag and lightbulb thing at the start of 07. It's so funny to me how very happy it does make me to bring my own bags. I never expected that it would make me feel so good... silly, i know. It's a confidence booster, thats for sure.
And I gave up news ages ago. I totally agree with you...
I also get a good feeling from bringing my own bags to the supermarket. Ever since I read that apparently the biggest manmade thing on earth is the glob of those plastic bags that is out in the middle of the ocean (I forget where I read that) I feel vaguely sick every time I even see one of those plastic bags.
And on the news thing, believe me, this is a huge thing for me. I was a newspaper reporter for years. I used to really believe many, many things I no longer believe about how our society works, and it depresses me a great deal. My main tactic now is denial! Which is so sad, but I think this is what happens when you have kids. Your immediate concern becomes dealing with your own family's needs. I just don't want to lose sight of opportunities to help others out where I can.
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