so this is the new year,

and I don't feel any different.

but I do. Don't you? You know every year when you wake up early on your birthday and think "Today I am seventeen, eighteen, twenty-five, forty." and you look in the mirror, and think "but I am just the same as I was yesterday."

I am not the same as I was yesterday, at least, not quite, even if I feel the same. But I am definitely not the person I was one year ago, and the number of things that have happened since January 1st, 2008 is somewhat overwhelming to think about.

For a song as long as The New Year (by Death Cab) you'd think that there'd be more lyrics.

So this is the new year
And I have no resolutions
For self assigned penance
For problems with easy solutions

I have really been trying to think of what to make a resolution about. I thought, "I will do better at work. I won't call in sick when I'm not sick. I won't stand around and avoid the supervisor instead of working."
I thought, "I will write in my journal everyday, and try to write something else. Work on a poem, a story, just describe something I see."
I thought, "I will do my freaking homework for once in my life. I'm better than the crappy grades that I get. Any intelligent person would be embarrassed by the report cards that I bring home."

So I stole Lauren's resolution. I am going to work hard.
You can (maybe) hold me to that.
Happy New Year.
Thank you for everything this last year, and all the years past.