2013 in Retrospect

January—This month was mostly quiet, coming back to my Foxhole to hole up after the holidays.  My only venture out of my daily life was a trip I took to Boston in the middle of the month.  I had no real reason to go when I did, and don’t ask me why I thought it would be a good idea to drive to Boston in January.  I just did.  I drove up with a good friend of mine, a full-day trip that was full of bathroom stops and singing loudly along with good music (lots of Disney songs).  My final destination was my aunt and uncle’s house, where I sent my friend on to her destination of Vermont and settled in for a few days.  I didn’t see much of the city: my concern was catching up with family and friends I hadn’t seen in a long time.  I even had the chance to visit with my sister, down from Albany.  It was nice, not only to see them all, but to assert my independence with my first long trip planned completely by myself.

February—I learned that working in a restaurant on Valentine’s Day week is not a good place to be.  I still feel tired just thinking about it.  Otherwise, nothing very remarkable happened this month, just work and friends and general living of life.

March—As in 2012, music was my primary focus in this month.  I had written a series of songs for my previous voice teacher to perform in April, and we met several times to rehearse.  They were based on a series of poems by Douglas Florian, all about bugs.  Cheerful, funny, and sometimes poignant, they were wonderful little pieces which I highly recommend, and I had a great time writing them.

April—The performance of the songs meant the end of one project—to which I got excellent feedback—and the beginning of another.  I worked for a good while on the soundtrack for a short film my friend Molly was working on.  This meant my first encounter with the electronic side of music—measuring the time periods of music, recording and editing sounds, and fitting music to images.  It was eye-opening, but more importantly, it led to a deep and lasting friendship that I treasure.  Molly and I also became members of a writing group which has since disbanded, but we still share stories about disagreeable characters and new plot twists, which is a joy to me.

May and June—I said goodbye to some wonderful connections, now if not lost, at least weakened.  The Hollins choir, the music department in general, and certain friends who were involved in these and once involved in my life—all of these were newly strange to me, and it made for a pensive anniversary of my graduation.  Still, I made new connections, too.  At the end of April I had become an official member of my church, and in May I began to take a more active role, accepting the temporary role of pianist.  This would be a source of both stress and joy in my life for weeks following.

July—I remember this month primarily by the bright red in my bankbook, but it was certainly worth it.  First on my list of extra expenses was my trip with Molly to the 48-Hour Film Festival in Richmond.  I joined the team as resident composer, which left me mostly on the sidelines as we worked to write, film, and edit a 5-7 minute film in two days.  There was not much sleeping on that weekend, and what sleep we got was in strange places—I remember the second night I slept across the top of a king-sized bed with at least five other acquaintances sleeping in with me.  But it was a blast, and we did very well, even if we didn’t win anything.  Later that month, I took a trip to Virginia Beach with my friends.  We did not actually spend very much time on the beach, but we did have a lot of fun.  The end of July, however, brought more pain than just the negative figures in my financial records.  During the last weekend of the month, my gran had a stroke and passed away. 

August and September—Family filled my mind this month, as I worried about my mother and my grandfather in equal measure.  My grandparents had been married for sixty-five years, and my grandfather’s entire life had been Gran.  He had taken care of her, helped her through her last days as speech and memory got harder and harder.  And the circumstances of my gran’s death had left my mother feeling distraught and guilty.  I worried for both of them, and for good reason, because the struggles weren’t over.  Only six weeks after my gran died, my grandfather followed him, and where we had thought we’d be holding a memorial for one, suddenly we were remembering them both.  Rest in peace, Ian and Stella.  I’m glad that now you’re together again.

October—My own life returned to the fore this month as I moved out of my beloved Foxhole into a new apartment with my friend Kathryn.  We did much exploring in the area and finally settled on a two-bedroom in the same complex I had been living with, but in a different building and now on the second floor.  The result has been delightful.  We not only have our own bedrooms, but a cozy sitting room with a lovely view out onto a private, wooded hill, and a small den which we have turned into a library.  The two of us work well together, both quiet, writerly figures who tolerate and even participate in one another’s weirdness.  We have dubbed our home Tookbank, in honor of our hobbit-like qualities, and enjoy it very much.  I’m very lucky to always have excellent roommates.

November—Settling into the new place occupied my mind for most of this month, as it takes a while for a new home to feel familiar.  I developed a ritual of waking up, getting a cup of tea, and sitting down in the library—it’s so lovely to say it—sitting down in the library to read for a while.  I wasn’t always sitting with my feet up, though.  Once again I participated in National Novel Writing Month, taking on a huge project which was probably a little too much for me, given the amount of research and work that would be required.  But with help and inspiration from my fellow NaNo writers, I managed to make the goal, and a new novel is well underway.  As if I didn’t have enough to do, I also continued my composing, working on a song for the Hollins choir based on a poem by a professor there.  It was great fun to work with Professor Larsen and Dr. Wahl, the choir director, on a project.  I have learned a real appreciation for collaboration this year.

December—Once again I wrangled four days off for Christmas, this time finding it a long expanse rather than a constraint as I had the year before.  Having become one of the senior workers at Ruby’s, I had fair choice of my schedule, and I have been very grateful for that privilege.  The first Christmas without my grandparents was very hard, especially as Christmas was Gran’s birthday.  It did make it clear to me, however, that my mother is healing, that however slowly, she will come to terms with their loss.  It is the nature of parents to leave their children behind, and with any luck those children will have people surrounding them to carry them forward, as my mother does.  We are all very lucky to have what we have.  Of course, this was hard to remember when my computer crashed at the end of the month, which is the reason I have not posted in the past few weeks.  But with the purchase of a new desktop computer (George III, aka Saint George), I am here again, and I say again: I am very lucky.

Happy New Year to all!  2013 was hard, one of the first years where I truly had to face loss.  That loss taught me about myself, about the way I handle grief and how I move on.  Looking back through my calendar, I was struck by the little moments that I haven’t mentioned here—lunches and dinners with my friends, trips to the movies, spring cleaning, nights of vodka and ice cream and mornings of tea parties.  These are the things which brighten my life, which move my days along through the larger meanings.  I am grateful for the little things, and I move into 2014 with a quieter heart, looking forward to many more little moments in the future.