The Year of the Dragon

This year is going to be the best one yet. I can just feel it. You know why? Because this year, finally, I am actually sticking to my new year's resolutions.

But before I get on to talking about my new year's resolutions, I just want to ruminate a bit on writing a blog. Right now I've got blogs out my ears, which makes me rethink the reason I returned to Blogger in the first place. But then I remember that I have kept journals since I was young, since when I was in elementary school in Riverside, around 10 or 11. (I can verify this, since my journals are all sitting in my bookshelf back at my parents' house.) The point, I guess, is that I've always found it helpful to write down my thoughts, my anxieties, my hopes—particularly if no one read them, since that would make me write more honestly.

Writing a blog isn't much different from writing a personal diary or a journal, since no one reads this blog except for me. But I suppose it makes me feel more accountable for what I say. And so: I am going to use this blog from now on to commit myself to things. Like: I shall practice writing in languages here, since even if no one reads it, it is still embarrassing to write stuff that is filled with simple grammatical errors.

(I also want to write more about the history of journal writing, soon, soon. I've already downloaded scholarly articles and looked up books about this topic...)

Now. My resolutions.

1. Simplify my life
2. Make productive use of time
3. Treat my body well
4. Spend good time with good people
5. Use language carefully

I spent a minute or two rearranging the order of the above resolutions. That alone was an interesting exercise. This is a busy but exciting quarter for me, and through it all I want to come back to writing about each one of those resolutions. What they mean, and why I have them.

After all, as E.M. Forster once said, "How can I tell what I think until I can see what I say?"