Today is December 31, 2011. It is a day known most remarkable for it's end, rather than it's beginning. Quite the opposite will be true of tomorrow, but we'll tackle that tomorrow. Both days converge in an orgasm of excitement, culminating single grand exaltation... Happy New Year!
It is time of renewal, of rebirth and it is a time when everything starts again. If you completely cocked up the last year, you are given an opportunity to start over in a socially acceptable way. (Smarter, more well rounded people would argue, correctly, that it need not be a new year to start again. But I digress.) If you were a bad spouse or child or employee, you can make strides to fix that problem. You are even given wishes to help you achieve your goal.
Semisonic, a Minnesota based band (now dis-banded), has a remarkable song on the subject of New Years called, fittingly, "This Will Be My Year". (Listen Here) A lyric from that song is quite appropriate in regards to our wishes, our New Years Resolutions...
I was always struck the power and poetry of the phrase "annual prayer" to mean a New Years Resolution. Both represent a promise for a better future, both are admitted quietly and honestly with one's self and, in most cases, most go unanswered.
I'll be the first to admit, I have failed at New Years Resolutions for years. I would say that I am only 20% successful. I am not thinner, I still don't have a license, I have no children, I have not finished those 37 projects I started... but I did make more than one movie in 2011. I am little better off this year than I was last year. Not financially maybe, but certainly creatively. I did meet one of my own goals and it wasn't nearly as hard as I made it all out out to be.
All of these similar large and small tasks I've set out to do recently.. I accomplished. This got me thinking.
What would happen if I set my sights higher? What if my New Years Resolution was more grand than I feel even I can accomplish? Something so very against everything I represent that it almost defies logic that I might actually achieve it?
My brother Christopher and his boyfriend Ricky came down from New England this past week to visit the Maryland family for the holidays. We were sitting down to dinner on one of those nights and my brother Christopher said that he had to enjoy the meal now, because when he returned to New England he would be trying a vegan diet. A strict vegan diet. No meat (of any kind), no dairy, no eggs, no honey. No animal related products of any kind. And as a kicker he said that he would also be nixing his entire caffeine intake. All for an entire month.
I did not question his motives. I know he has reasons for this, but none are really required. No one should feel the need to explain why they eat what they eat. Unless it is medical, your diet is entirely optional and entirely no one's business... Unless you're into cannibalism... In which case you have made your diet my business. We encouraged my brave brother to blog about his experiences, which I hope he will.
A comment was made, not sure by who, that suggested that in no known universe could Adam (That's me by the way...) ever do that same diet. They were right of course. I love meat. I would never even consider giving it up. I think Vegans are food themselves!
I happen to know a few Vegan and their lesser Vegetarian cousins. The one's I know are NOT hemophiliac pod-people, but vibrant young people. I think on these friends fondly... But I could never be one of them, could I?
Then it hit me, why not? Could I, like my brother, be a vegan for a month?
For the Month of January 2012, I will be a Vegan.
It is time of renewal, of rebirth and it is a time when everything starts again. If you completely cocked up the last year, you are given an opportunity to start over in a socially acceptable way. (Smarter, more well rounded people would argue, correctly, that it need not be a new year to start again. But I digress.) If you were a bad spouse or child or employee, you can make strides to fix that problem. You are even given wishes to help you achieve your goal.
Semisonic, a Minnesota based band (now dis-banded), has a remarkable song on the subject of New Years called, fittingly, "This Will Be My Year". (Listen Here) A lyric from that song is quite appropriate in regards to our wishes, our New Years Resolutions...
- "Counting down from ten it's time to make out annual prayer." - Semisonic, This Will Be My Year, Feeling Strangely Fine
I was always struck the power and poetry of the phrase "annual prayer" to mean a New Years Resolution. Both represent a promise for a better future, both are admitted quietly and honestly with one's self and, in most cases, most go unanswered.
I'll be the first to admit, I have failed at New Years Resolutions for years. I would say that I am only 20% successful. I am not thinner, I still don't have a license, I have no children, I have not finished those 37 projects I started... but I did make more than one movie in 2011. I am little better off this year than I was last year. Not financially maybe, but certainly creatively. I did meet one of my own goals and it wasn't nearly as hard as I made it all out out to be.
- In early October I successfully lead a rag tag group of troops under my own banner and made a short film for the 72 Film Fest. (Not the right time to discuss it, but it will be mentioned in many later posts.)
- In November, on the spur of the moment, I entered and completed the Nanowrimo. (Once again, another time.)
All of these similar large and small tasks I've set out to do recently.. I accomplished. This got me thinking.
What would happen if I set my sights higher? What if my New Years Resolution was more grand than I feel even I can accomplish? Something so very against everything I represent that it almost defies logic that I might actually achieve it?
My brother Christopher and his boyfriend Ricky came down from New England this past week to visit the Maryland family for the holidays. We were sitting down to dinner on one of those nights and my brother Christopher said that he had to enjoy the meal now, because when he returned to New England he would be trying a vegan diet. A strict vegan diet. No meat (of any kind), no dairy, no eggs, no honey. No animal related products of any kind. And as a kicker he said that he would also be nixing his entire caffeine intake. All for an entire month.
I did not question his motives. I know he has reasons for this, but none are really required. No one should feel the need to explain why they eat what they eat. Unless it is medical, your diet is entirely optional and entirely no one's business... Unless you're into cannibalism... In which case you have made your diet my business. We encouraged my brave brother to blog about his experiences, which I hope he will.
A comment was made, not sure by who, that suggested that in no known universe could Adam (That's me by the way...) ever do that same diet. They were right of course. I love meat. I would never even consider giving it up. I think Vegans are food themselves!
I happen to know a few Vegan and their lesser Vegetarian cousins. The one's I know are NOT hemophiliac pod-people, but vibrant young people. I think on these friends fondly... But I could never be one of them, could I?
Then it hit me, why not? Could I, like my brother, be a vegan for a month?
For the Month of January 2012, I will be a Vegan.
Good luck on your conquest!!! I know that I could never do it because I like meat ad dairy items waay too much to give them up willingly.
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