For 2011: Let Us Resolve

Heaven knows I have an ambiguous relationship with New Year's resolutions. In recent years I have not made any, because all of those plans to lose 25 pounds, exercise more, write on the blog every day, start garden seeds in March, have all the Christmas presents bought or made by October 30--you know the kind--never come to fruition. Earlier today I posted what I thought were some modest, achievable resolutions on FB but got what amounted to rebukes from a couple of dearest family and friends. They never make resolutions, they said. The compliant me wants to take that as some kind of suggestion that I shouldn't either. But I'm taking a cue from the geraniums that are blooming in the south windows despite the conventional wisdom that they should be hibernating, or even dead. I'm going to make and publish some resolutions anyway. It's one way to try to hold myself accountable.

Last year I made two resolutions: to spend about 1/2 day two days a week working on my family history/memoir project and to spend about 1/2 a day two days a week on quilting projects. I'm the first to note that I didn't make these quotas at least half of the time. However, I did make progress that I had only dreamed about before. The writing project is still gathering steam, but over the year I visited the Special Collections room at the County Library several times in addition to taking genealogy classes there. On our summer vacation I was able to put some of that research to work and I now have field notes and photos from North Carolina. I also have a lot more questions to be chased down in Tennessee, Kentucky, and Alabama, as well as western Oklahoma and west Texas, not to mention southwest Missouri. The quilting projects fared much better if completion was the goal. First, I finished piecing the Linville Family reunion quilt, got it to the Spanish Lake quilters and logged some 75-80 hours working with them between July and December, when it was finished. I still need to add three names to the border and bind it, but it will be ready for the guild quilt show in September 2011. I also joined the scrap quilt club and although the goal was a project a month, I concentrated on finishing two tops and making substantial progress on two more. That is a huge percentage increase in number of projects finished for me! In addition, I completed all 12 of the optional blocks of the month for the guild, something I have never done before in my 20 or so years as a member. So overall, I think having the resolutions kept me going when I was perhaps distracted by other things such as joining Facebook, church volunteering, etc.

So--what's up for 2011?

• Quilting: finish the binding on the reunion quilt. Send the two completed tops from last year to long arm quilters so they will be done! Finish the two tops I have started. Start a brand new project, a baby quilt that I have pattern and fabric for, and work on it at the guild retreat in February. Learn better technique for machine quilting and do a small project of mine.
• Writing: continue research but write a first draft of Emma and Jesse's story to take it out of my head and into a form others can critique for me. Move the stories of Belle, Sarah and Martha into more details from research I have already done. Outline the story of my grandparents and parents and do a better job of preserving original documents.
• Blogging: Do at least one post a month on Compton Rising and on Thursday's Child, instead of letting them lie fallow like I did in 2010. That, or take them down. Blog a minimum of twice a week on Home Stories, and take more photos for the blog as well.
• Technology: stop procrastinating and update my Apple OS so I can use some of the newer versions of Word, Quicken, and Family Tree Maker (it's finally out for Macs...but not those running 10.4) And then gather up the 4 or 5 dead Macs in this house and either donate them if they can be used by anyone or else take them to WITS for recycling.
  
• DeCluttering: last, but not least--more likely foremost. We will have lived in this house 10 years come July, and the amount of stuff in it has almost doubled. My goal is to do at least 10 minutes a day on this. It's insurmountable otherwise. Today I decluttered my Yahoo inbox by unsubscribing from some 7 causes and political sites that I had acquired but am no longer interested in. Then I cleaned out the bathroom medicine cabinet and threw away outdated cosmetics and other mystery substances. I may post every time I toss or recycle some 7 items on my FB page, again, to keep me accountable.

Ultimately, it is all about accountability. In the days before blogs and social media, people like me kept diaries. I have them from age 9 on up through college and early married life, but then I stopped keeping them. For years, on January 1, I would try to start a new chapter in a diary but it would last only a few days. I think that's because a diary has an audience of one. After I became a journalist, and learned about writing for someone else than myself, diaries seemed too self-absorbed. I was also teaching and writing and didn't have time. But every time I log in to FB and see whether anyone has commented on a picture or a status, or sent me a message, or every time I check my SiteMeter stats on my blogs, I know whether or not someone is paying attention to what I say. Often these readers do serve to hold me accountable, just as the FBers today who have no use for resolutions. They forced me to think about why I do still have resolutions, and why I want someone else to know, so I can report my progress (or lack thereof) to someone else besides myself. Because an audience of one is no audience at all.