Transitioning the Calendar Year

Our next two Shabbatot coincide with American legal holidays, Christmas and New Year's Day.  They are also transition points for me personally.  While working, I could expect Xmas to be an active day or weekend, sometimes a long one, taking call for patients who did everything they could to avoid the hospital.  As a result, I always had New Years off, taking it as minor revelry at home with some champagne as I watched the Big Steel Ball knock down New York.  More importantly, it was the first day of my new semi-annual initiatives, which always began a little behind the 8-ball needing some catchup sleep.  So it goes this transition too, though in retirement, Christmas is a day off.  An uncertain shul day, but I have a reason to go this year, even if a personal imposition.  I set my twelve initiatives on good paper in indelible ink with colored gel pens.  I transition the whiteboard after Christmas and begin doing them on New Years.  Some are maintained, some replaced.  While I've focused on weight and waist measurements, this half-year I will be shifting to treadmill performance, the anthropomorphic measurements having remained static for over a year.  I want to be more consistent with expressing myself, usually via writing.  Those projects continue though with a better performance focus and mileposts.  My day trips continue, again with more focus, allowing for an overnight adventure.  My Family Room being a lost cause, I shifted the home efforts to My Space and my gardens.  I've derived benefit from logging expenses, both from the data generated and from my reliability in doing this.  It continues.  I need to do better as a husband, I think, whether my wife agrees or not.  That becomes a focus for the next six months.  I'm satisfied with what I've chosen to pursue.  After months of ennui, I feel more of an inner drive to see what among these I can accomplish and how much satisfaction or frustration each effort generates.