2023 Is The Year I Blinked

Usually, I don’t do a review of a year until December. But I just reviewed 2023 because it feels like I blinked, and it’s over. I looked over my daily log, and things that happened just a month or so feel like they were from last year. So much has happened in such a short time.

Now, I know it isn’t “over” yet, but as fast as it’s going, I know it will be December tomorrow. Or it will feel that way. Yesterday was June, and today is October. So tomorrow will have to be December if we go by that time frame.

I have a daily planner that I use to log each day’s happenings at the end of the day. Then I can look back to a particular day to bring it back to mind. Recently I reviewed the planner for 2023. How can it be January or June and not years ago when some of these things happened?

At the beginning of the year, I began working on making some personal development pages. My plan for this year had been to work on me. I wanted to do a lot of inner work, to get to know myself intimately. Self-help pages created by me, for me, were going to change my life.

They never made it past January. They are on the computer, half-finished. Also in January, I began my Facebook group “Facebook Sleuths Deconstructing Scammers” to help teach people about scams and scammers. And THAT has taken on a whole new life of its own. And filled a lot of MY time in my life this year.

In March I had internet installed at the house.  My hotspot couldn’t handle the screenshots I created and posted when I warned people about scams and chased scammers across Facebook on the days when I had the energy and time.

Also in March, my sister was here to use a computer for her daughter to do some homeschooling work since her computer died. And on that day my sister helped me get some cleaning done I’d been waiting for a long time to get some help. Looking back it seems like it was last year already.

I must have blinked away April and May. My planner doesn’t show anything major happening during those months in my personal life except for a haircut (in which I had my hair cut shorter than it’s ever been), and my husband’s latest eye surgery. There were a couple of deaths, some new roses, and a lot of Spring work. My life wasn’t empty.

June was busy with my anti-scam group. We did an investigation into Temu. Some called it a scam. Others defended it loyally. In the end, we decided to just say “buyer beware”. Our group managed to retake a Jack Russell group from scammers cleaned it out and made it good again.

The summer heat was extremely hard for me to deal with this year. I’ve always been particularly sensitive to heat, but as I’ve gotten older it affects me more and more.

Through all of this, we were without a vehicle for the months of July and August and had to get rides where we could. Our Jeep had issues. I had a car accident in it when the brakes failed completely and I ended up in the woods. Thankfully I didn’t have any visible injuries, but the bruises showed up in the days that followed.

We’ve had a big storm leaving us without power for a couple of days, paperwork stress dealing with Medicare/Medicaid, and I think there has been a death of someone in the family or a very close friend every single month of this year.

And through all of this, the regular day-to-day chores and errands still needed handling. Bills still need to be paid. The roses still need to be weeded, watered, and taken care of. The dogs need their time and attention. Dishes and housework don’t stop just because we get busy.

And neither does the pain. Or the other physical issues my body deals with as I have grown older, tired, and worn out. Some days I just COULDN’T do anything. But I tried and pushed.

So many people think I can sit down at a computer and at least get stuff done that way when pain strikes. It isn’t like that. Pain steals energy. It’s not just a physical limitation. One way to look at it is that you have one gallon of energy at any given time. You can use that gallon to get something done if you aren’t dealing with pain. But if you have pain, that gallon is used up just trying to mentally and emotionally deal with the physical pain. There is no more energy left to actually DO something.

I blinked. I must have. But time didn’t stop. In fact, looking at my log, it would appear that it flew instead. 2023 still has almost 3 months left. But if they fly as quickly as the last 9, I won’t remember them.

And yet, one of the things this year has taught me is to quit blinking. Not literally, of course. But people are gone much too suddenly to take anyone for granted. Big life changes happen with no warnings.

Don’t wake up one day to a whole new world, wondering what happened and thinking, “I blinked and they are gone.” Take time now with the people who are important. Do the things you’ve always wanted to do. Your health isn’t forever. You don’t want to be in my shoes and wish you had done more when you could.

Find the time for the things and the people who are important.