Not a Shiny Happy

This post is not a shiny happy one... so, you've been warned.

Every year about this time, I write some saccharine poetic piece about my hopes for the future. But this year I just can't. There is no grassy knoll in my burnt forest. There is no imminent change. And no, I don't feel hopeful. And just the thought of the future seems insurmountable.

In trying to recap this crappy year...(Velvet said 2009 was Spectacular for its Suckitude. I think that sums up 2010 nicely!).. I thought I would do something a little more thoughtful. Alison started the Thirty Days of Truth project and I thought of joining in but in the end both of us decided it was just too negative. Then I found Reverb10, but it seemed to require more effort than this crapfest deserved. So here it is:

• I still have no job and no prospects. I'm starting to question if I will ever make any real money ever again.
• A 23 year friendship bit the dust because I got tired of doing all the rowing (Old Southern adage: If you want to know if a relationship is working, stop rowing the boat and see if it moves. It didn't; so I did.)
• I had a spider bite that nearly killed me.
• Mabel finally got a boyfriend - and he moved away. She still lingers when we pass his now empty house.
• January brought floods and debris down from our burn area. And allergies to all dogs and this person.
• I lost my cell phone on the way to the airport.
• Owed money to the IRS for the first time in decades - all for robbing my OWN retirement account to keep a roof over my head!
• My left elbow went numb in April. In June I developed excruciating pain in my right one. I spent most of the summer and fall in severe pain and too broke to go to the doctor after paying for my Blue Cross insurance every month. 
• In July, I went in for a pain in a front tooth. Thousands of bucks, a root canal, a cap and 8 visits to dentists / endodontists and six months later, I'm going to lose said tooth... but only if I can come up with the money to have it pulled. Won't that make me look oh so cute in job interviews?
• My desktop computer died.

But in all honesty, it wasn't all horrible: 

• I have about the same amount of money in the bank this year as I did last. Guess I did something right. 
• Excellent hikes after the storm was over.
• New Years Day was one of the best days of the year. I went on an amazing hike with that friend of 23 years. It's how our friendship was on this day before all the strain that forced the break that I prefer to remember instead of all the nothing that came at the end. (I really don't think she even cares we're not friends anymore.)  
• I got my cell phone back!
• Saved all the files off the old desktop.
• Bart joined our pack and the BFF comes to the creek!
• More new friends at the creek: Ruby and Choloe the dobie. 
• My sister came out for the first time in ages and we had a blast.
• Road trip with the bestie, full of giggles. 
• I sold more glass beads than ever before... still not enough to call it income, but progress!

So there it is. It feels like way more bad than good. And, in my own mind, I've already kicked 2010 to the curb days ago. Good riddance!

As for 2011, I stopped dreaming of any more than the basics: roof over my head, food in my pantry, gas in the car. Anything more feels ... frivolous! But my sincere hope that in 2011, we all get a hand (or a foot) up in the new year.