Twenty Years Here. Twenty Years More?
In 2019, I’ve gotten a little trendy. With New Year’s Eve being my favorite holiday since childhood, I always get into resolutions. But this year, I stepped it up and chose a word of the year (delight), made a “19 for 2019” list of things I want to accomplish, and wrote my own happiness project. The happiness project is pretty involved, has categories, and stands alone as a relative guide for how I wish to approach life. The categories are things like Physical Self, Life Outlook, Communication, Productivity, and Fun-and-Play-and-Feel-Good-Stuff. I’ve referred to it often in the past seven months and have found it to be very grounding. Item number 9 under “Fun and Play and Feel Good Stuff” is: make peace with NoVa or make a plan to really take steps elsewhere. Twenty years ago, on August 5th, I drove a rickety U-Haul truck one-way from Harrisonburg, VA to Fairfax, VA. I still remember frantically cleaning and throwing things out of the college apartment minutes before l