2008 In Review

I'm not sure how to summarize what 2008 was for me. A lot of things happened; good times and bad; personal progress & accomplishments offset by setbacks and failure. Perhaps it was a year of laying groundwork - calibrating my attitude, gathering tools, identifying what i need to do. Settling into a new town, trying things & seeing what works. Trying to heal & rebuild my life.

Time seems to pass more quickly with each day, yet i feel like 2008 was a long year.

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The Good:

- Made some new friends, reconnected with old ones. Special thanks to Facebook for faciliating a lot of this (read "saving my social life").

- Finally started to build an online presence, mostly with Facebook, Twitter, and my blog.

- Live music is one of my passions, so it's pretty awesome to be able to catch so many of my bands when they come through San Francisco (as opposed to the 3-4 hour drive to Chicago from Champaign). Before i moved here, i was able to hit about 4 shows per year. In 2008 i attended 18 (more on that in an upcoming post).

- Started up made progress on a personal project.

- Started following news, current events, and politics to the point where i no longer feel clueless. Huge thanks to NPR for keeping me in the loop, especially KQED's Forum.

- The Floor of Dreams Lindy Exchange, back home in Champaign-Urbana. One of the best weekends i've ever had, at a time when i desperately needed the boost. After wondering if i'd lost swing dancing forever (more on that below), it was it was a relief to find that it was still possible for dancing to be good. To *feel* good. And having so many wonderful friends welcome me home with open arms just elevated the experience into the realms of overwhelming.

- Speaking of overwhelming, it was wonderful to reconnect with and strengthen ties with some close family friends and their kids over holiday break. Not only did my mom and i host dinner on Christmas as planned, but i ended up spending 6 days straight with some or all of them. 3 families, 7 kids total ranging from 4 to 12 years old; i've known them almost from when they were born - they're growing up fast! Hanging out with my little friends reminded me what life is about. Photos on Facebook.


The Bad:

- The thing which i've struggled to come to terms which but is still on my mind most of the time. I don't want to talk about it, and i'm sure you guys are tired of hearing it. Thus, i'll leave it at that.

- Lost the time & place for swing dancing. FDLX notwithstanding, i did not dance at all in 2008. I did check out a few local swing dance scenes after moving here, but i found myself not enjoying them much so i slowly stopped going. I considered the depressing possibility that i was just done with dance, but FDLX strenuously disproved that. I must revisit this issue in 2009.


The Ugly:

- Made good progress with diet & exercise, but then hit a wall and eventually regressed to being a lazy fatass.

- Managed to stop watching tv entirely for most of the year, but then went on like a month-long bender with the Olympics, Netflix, and whatever crap i could find on broadcast. Back to the old pattern of wasting hours every night watching useless stuff. Need to re-establish a balance - just follow the few shows i actually care about (Fringe, Heroes, Lost, How I Met Your Mother), and free up the remaining time for useful stuff.

- Started rock climbing; took a class at Planet Granite, got into a nice climbing routine, making noticable improvements, and had a nice synergy with my (then) workout routine. Then my belay partner ditched me; went through a couple of flakey belay partners before finally giving up.

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I'm working on a goal package for 2009 which i may or may not post here. I'm trying to address all of the Bad and Ugly items above, but i'm also trying hard to make my goals realistic, and to prioritize so i can actually make things happen without failing halfiway through or regressing a few months later. Stay tuned.