The thing I like best about the New Year is: You don’t know.
You don’t know what is going to happen to you in the next year, what gifts the next 12 months will bring. You can’t predict whom you will meet, what you will learn, the new experiences you will have.
This, I know, is not the typical way of looking at the coming year. Most people make resolutions — they decide what they want to change in their lives, and use the blank slate of January to try to make that happen.
I admire that. I admire the people, especially, who make resolutions and keep them, who are able to create big change by making big goals.
But after years of failed personal resolutions — lose 10 pounds! Balance my checkbook every day! Stop eating sugar! — I’ve realized I’m not a resolutions type of girl.
Where other people make plans, I like to stay open to possibilities.
The nice thing about being open to an uncertain future is that — well, the future is uncertain. We always think we can plan for it. We think we know what will happen to us. But we just can’t predict.
So a couple years ago, I decided that instead of fighting that uncertainty, I would look forward to it, as if each mysterious day was a present in pretty wrapping.
Last January, I was miserable. I was living in a tense housing situation. I had very little agency in my job, which left me bored. I had just lost health insurance. I was tired of being single — but after 20-something first dates found on Match.com and arranged by friends, I was also tired of looking.
We’ve all had periods of time like that, right? Where you look around and all you see is darkness; where you can’t take a step forward because the fog is so thick you can’t see the road.
In the middle of all that misery, I had a conversation with a consoling friend.
“At least,” I said, “it’s January.”
She looked at the early dark, at the faces of passersby cramped by cold, and raised an eyebrow.
“No, really,” I said. “A full year is ahead of us. Anything could happen.”
I told myself I would just keep my head down, make the small changes I could and see what happened. I wouldn’t let myself fall into despair.
And then I had a year I couldn’t have predicted. One of those crazy magic years that — if we’re lucky — happen once in our lifetimes.
My job became challenging, deeply satisfying and wildly fun. Health insurance returned, accompanied by other benefits. I was on the floor of the Democratic National Convention when Obama gave his historic acceptance speech. I moved to an apartment with a yard. In Manhattan.
And, most unexpected of all, I started dating the woman whom I now hope to marry. A woman I had never met before this past summer.
The fragments of my life, which had been floating around like mismatched jigsaw pieces, suddenly clicked into place.
And now here we are at January.
January, the blank slate. January, when anything can happen.
Sure, plenty of bad things happen in a year. Awful bad things. Bad things that we think we might not be able to get through.
And with the economy, this coming year already looks particularly rough. Friends, family members, colleagues are being laid off. Loans are scarce. We are all keeping our heads down. We are all hoping to keep our jobs — if we still have them.
But for me, the idea of January is that there is always hope in unexpected places: $20 in an old pair of pants that you won’t come across until you desperately need it. A long-lost friend who will renew contact. A person you will meet who will be the key to your next job, next apartment, next unbelievable experience.
We don’t know what will happen this year. That’s something we can all look forward to.
Jennifer Vanasco is an award-winning syndicated columnist. E-mail her at [email protected].