Oh, my Buffistas. I hesitate to use the word "challenging" as that's Corporate shine to polish shit.

But we have been sore challenged this year. Or let us use Ahab's phrase to describe the whale: "He tasks me." We have been tasked.

I am so deeply impressed by all the teachers who have had to negotiate this strange landscape of a year. I know it is exhausting.

And such deep respect for everybody who worked so hard (often well out of their comfort zones) on this election.

ND, I too have deep admiration for your ethical commitment to your staff as you worked through the worst possible economic circumstances for your industry.

I'm so sad about DXM.

I'm sad but also happy that we have made time to love on Amyth. I wish we'd had that time with ita, DXM and Ginger and Connie and BJ and Ouise and Frankenbuddha. To tell them that they were loved, and central to our community.

Our family has had a bad year. JZ lost her father to Covid. We had a quarantine at the beginning of the lockdown, and were dependent on friends (like, Deb, and Juliana and Martin) to stay fed.

Matilda lost so much this year. Her grandfather. Her hopes for high school. Her friends. Separated from her brother.

And we have moved through Jacqueline's grief and Matilda's depression and loss, setbacks and obstacles, each of us deprived of the sustaining graces we depend upon. Time alone. Outward focus. Friendships.

We are poised on a new year. I am ready to release grief, and stress and tension and move into it.

I am ready for a new day.

That is beautiful David. I too am ready for a new day.

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Wrong thread.

I... can't even begin to sum up the past year, except to note both that it has left me a wreck and that I'm still acutely, shamefully aware of my privilege. How many people do I know (including my David) who had lost one parent or both long before now? And also to note that this community has been a lifeline during many, many terrible months, and I'm infinitely grateful. With how terrible I still am about posting and staying current I don't deserve it, but I feel it, and it's kept me from flying into pieces.

And Matilda, my Matilda, has felt it all so much more crushingly than I have and has had to deal with all my losses and more, and David has picked up so much emotional slack and kept us both so much more anchored and steady than either of us was capable of on our own.

I love you guys.

Begone, demon year.

I started to make a post a couple weeks ago, and then I just got bogged down. And then I realized that I didn't need to list things. (I've read all of your lovely and gracious posts, is how I figured that out.)

I am so happy to see this year over and have some light for humanity with vaccines to address the pandemic and a new U.S. new administration to address... everything we've fucked up in four scant years plus, start to address, I'm hoping, centuries upon centuries of dedicated, targeted harm. Neither is a cure for all of the world's ills, but both are better.

I very personally had more good this year than last. My medical woes that started in March 2019 seem generally resolved, and I'm still here. Neither of those were necessarily sure bets every day for a long while, but March/April of 2020 was the start of the real road to recovery, and it's been steady. Obviously, the dreams of many fun and exciting dinners and adventures with friends and family didn't materialize, but imagining them got me through a lot in the hospital, so, when they finally happen, it'll be that much sweeter, I suspect.

My DP has a new job that he loves with a bunch of smart people that he enjoys working with. It had been a long haul of unemployment coupled with caring for me when I was home off-and-on (which had many components), so to see him happily career-productive again is a joy. And it has allowed me the latitude to get to a place where my brain and body are functioning well enough to seriously handle working again. I mean, now I have to find a job, so there's that, but all in all, I feel good and ready to enter the world again when it opens up. I'm grateful for both the time and the end result.

It has been a joy to "come back" to the b.org, so that's definitely a huge positive for me and 2020. I am continually amazed by you all -- what and how you go through life's ups, downs, and "Seriously, universe, WTF?"s, what you bring to others, your sense of humor, your passions, your willingness to share the good, the bad, and the real, the support you provide to this community and to your own "world." This is a good place, yes.

So, bring on 2021 and what it holds.

Well. I didn't want to post this until they year was over, just in case (I have a friend whose brand new car was rear-ended and totaled, on 30DEC!) I had high hopes for 2020. My 2019 was pretty awesome sauce (though looking back at my entry last year, that's a bit hard to see, but I don't think it's ONLY in comparison to 2020!). My 2020 started off amazing--taking weight lifting classes and deadlifting my body weight repeatedly. Going to a friend's wedding. Visiting my friend in Portland a few times, and going to a dance convention down there. Finally getting a scan for my ankle and confirming I wasn't crazy and there WAS inflammation not seen on an X-ray, and scheduling surgery. Heading to Mexico with my sister and BIL.

But even then COVID was creeping in--we weren't sure we'd be allowed back, and spent way more time than usual on vacation reading the news and seeing the crazy updates. And then home to lockdown. Which as a single person, and as an extrovert, and as someone whose favorite hobby involves being up close with and touching multiple people in rotation all evening long? Yeah. It has been seriously sucky. I do credit my antidepressant with working pretty damn well--I'm definitely still depressed and getting nothing done, but more in a lazy way, less in a "I should probably not keep going" way.

Right before COVID, I did sign up to get a puppy, but thought it would be until the end of this year at least. All of the foster cats and dogs were swept up by all the people suddenly working from home, so no kittens this year. And then there were two big litters of puppies and suddenly I had a puppy! Which has been....exhausting? And great. But very exhausting.

I did manage to spend some time with friends outdoors in the summer, and pod with friends for the election (thank god for the election!) but generally this has been a shitty lonesome year. On the other hand, I'm still employed and doing well, I did finally get that hardware removal surgery (even though it was initially postponed due to COVID) and my ankle is doing well (today is the two year anniversary of being allowed to start putting weight on it!). I haven't gotten COVID, despite having a roommate for most of the year who worked in multiple hospitals and didn't always take it seriously because she figured she'd already had it. So it could've been a LOT worse, in so many ways. But I have high hopes for 2021...eventually. Even if the first quarter or half is still going to be more of the same suck.

I think the best way a friend put it for 2020 is "I feel like I survived a horror movie, but also know that I'm starring in the sequel...." We made it! But there's still a long way to go. Here's hoping the way isn't as long as we fear, and is easier than expected as well. Y'all have definitely been great to have this whole time--friends in a box don't go anywhere even if you can't see people IRL!

Well, 2020 was a year. Big picture, my family is fine and a lot better off than most. mr. flea has been working at home happily - more happily than being at work - and seems to be likely to continue doing so for some time, maybe forever. The kids' school (a demanding college-prep public high school) handled the pivot to distance learning fairly well in March and settled into virtual school really strongly in the fall. They already had all the technological infrastructure in place, and the district handed out notebooks over the summer, and the teachers are really doing a great job. Our school is so overcrowded that even when most of the district started to have in-person classes with cohorts, we stayed virtual, which means that the routine can persist and which works so much better for the curriculum.

Dillo (14) is pretty happy with this setup. He does school during school hours and manages to get most of his homework done during the scraps between classes, and then watches Youtube and plays video games with his friends online. He occasionally meets up with one friend in the neighborhood to play in person, or meets him at the park. He's getting the same grades he got when school was in person. He has mastered pie crust. Casper (17) hates everything about the way school is now, and is in constant danger of failing things, including things that wold pose big hurdles to her graduating. She's a senior, and she finally has a friend group she feels like she belongs in, and while they chat online constantly and play D&D in Discord and have gotten together in person a couple of times it's not the same. She doesn't know what she wants to do in the future and has not yet applied to college, and spends a big proportion of her time avoiding things and watching all the anime (Attack on Titan, anyone?). She is seeing a therapist and we're making an appointment with a psychiatrist to discuss medication. She's trying, but it's really hard for her.

I ragequit/mental health quit my job in July, and then three weeks later my entire department was furloughed and encouraged to apply for other openings in the system, which did not exactly ease my rage. A couple retired, a couple are now employed in the system at well below their skill and pay grade, and some have left, probably permanently. I'm still unpacking the mental issues seven years at this job caused me, notably the feeling that not being allowed to do very much for 7 years has led to an atrophying of my skills and overall brain, rendering me unsuited for future employment. I"m not sure what I want to do next. I have the luxury of taking my time to decide and doing family support right now, and am trying to appreciate that, but I wallow in despair between 3 and 4 pm daily.

I'm trying to focus on the solstice being over, snowdrops coming out and soon the rest of the slow creep towards spring, and appreciating the fact that we are very lucky.