Thursday, December 29, 2011

Reverb11 -- Day 29 -- Shake it up, baby!

#1 Prompt: Shaking Things Up - Looking towards 2012, what can you do to shake things up a little next year?

#2 Prompt: Expectation: What is on expectation you fiercely held for 2011 that you wish to let go of before 2012? What steps are required to putting it to rest?

#1 -- Hooyeah. I think retirement is gonna shake stuff up pretty good without any effort on my part at all. For the first time since August 2007, Tony will be home with me every day, all day, and neither of us will have a J.O.B. We can sculpt our own days, our trips, our routines, we can go to matinees in the middle of the week, we can be couch potatoes whenever we want.  


I expect the year to be interesting, exciting, enjoyable, and joyful. Even the parts about washing windows and putting down gallons of RoundUp -- because we don't have to wait for a decent weekend! Yay for retirement!


#2 -- Generally I try not to have big expectations about much of anything but to try to watch events unfold the way they will. Especially as a 20-30-something, and beyond too, I would plan out events in my head and anticipate them with great delight, and then be bitterly disappointed (and a bit of a martyr, too, if I'm honest) when things didn't work out the way I'd expected them to. I remember, for instance, a visit to the Maine coast many, many years ago (I was in my mid-20s), and we'd planned to have a picnic on a beach and then go for a dip in the ocean -- something I had never done, much less in Maine. The day dawned cloudy and quite cool with threatening rain, and the ocean was every bit as frigid as our northern Pacific coast, and I was soooo disappointed that I whined and complained for the rest of the day, endearing myself so greatly to my husband and parents, of course. 


Some years later I read a horoscope book that discussed in depth the characteristics of the Scorpio-Sagittarius cusp, and was smacked upside the head by the 'martyr' description that was included in some undesirable traits. Ever since then, I've tried to keep my expectations in check and to squelch the inner martyr. 


The biggest expectation I can think of for 2011 was Tony's retirement date which for several years we'd anticipated happening first in May (which got changed in August 2010) , and then in mid-August, which didn't happen. Then it was going to be July 31, 2012, but after a couple of months of wrapping our heads around that date, the Universe intervened once again. It might actually have been today, but he agreed to stay on a bit longer, so at this writing it will be March 31 at the latest. I don't think that will get pushed out again. 

We were able to let go of the different dates as the situation changed, and I'm proud of that. We worked together to talk it out and work through the different scenarios, and once it was past, we let it be and didn't revisit it. 


That's really how I try to live my life these days -- kind of like being on a ship on the ocean and needing to keep your balance depending on the size of the swells. Some swells ask a little effort more from us, but everything changes from moment to moment. We can anticipate, but we must remain flexible and ready to move quickly. Not a bad way to live, I think.

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