A Very Jobless Resolution

Each year, I consider “New Year's resolutions” and usually start by deciding whether or not this year I think they're bullshit. Some years, I go with it. I make a short passable list of crap that I probably, actually, should do anyway--have a photo exhibit, learn French once and for all, apply to graduate school.

But let's face it--what's so great about January 1st and why must this be the time to make a change? It's an easy starting point, the beginning of a year, to not only compare ourselves to ourselves one year ago, but also to compare ourselves to each other. We can say, "I did this in 2008," ask "what did YOU do this year?", and then rejoice with eminence and nostalgia when the ball drops again. It's silly and I won't do it.

And then a thought occurred to me--a desperate hope of reason that might be behind this crackpot tradition: If we“improve ourselves" in unison at the new year... maybe... as everyone begins to kick righteous ass at the same time... in the end (it's possible)... we can create this magnificent change as a whole, en mass--a movement, a revolution!... and all be kinder, for example. World peace is within our grasp and I've been too stubborn and foolish to accept it. Ya, well... It's a nice thought and I wish it would happen, people, but let's get real.

In truth, I am in a constant state of “self-improvement.” Endless self-improvement. I demand a regular reflective moment, an annual thrashing plus a few lazy days of self-judgment along the way to dutifully keep myself in check. I have to keep my ego in check, my serious spending in check, my forward movement and goal fluidity in check. Normally, this depressing moment of truth is saved for my birthday, since the New Year has nothing to do with me and I like everything to have to do with ME.

Birthdays in my journal are plagued with the hideous ups and downs of the last year and the expectant, fluttering cherubs of hope and possibility for the coming months. I make an effort to report back to these pages and make note of any advancements, however unoften they're met with success. (Ahem... the examples I gave above were on my list from almost 2 years ago...)

But I've had a few breakthroughs, a few years with one or two substantial goals struck from the list like the tramps they are. A few years ago, I traveled abroad alone for the first time. Before that, I wrote my first television script for broadcast. Another year, I moved across the country. Last year, I swam in the ocean again and quit my job to finally make my own films.

I also did a few things I never expected to do but remembered as milestones in retrospect, like learning the most rudimentary, passable Italian and going to dinner completely alone... a new tradition. I’ve made friends with some very cool and unexpected people, and I've visited places I never thought I had an interest in, like Nicaragua and Sicily.

In fact, it's pretty goddamn fun to write down fleeting fantasies that spring into my gullible mind. Especially the ones that are at first glance completely ridiculous but also from a cruel source of credibility. A look back a year later will usually prove these were the real enchiladas. These triumphs confirm that my soul has not completely wimped-out to the schemes of my brain. I've also found the best stuff takes more than a year to materialize, which is fine, I'm slow, I can live with that.

That being said, I have a few thing I think I can“resolve" to change this year. For the sake of you readers (and for my current jobless situation that needs as many checks as possible,) I'll do it now and you can call them New Year's resolutions or whatever. My birthday hasn't exactly given me the results I've wanted, anyway.

My Current Resolutions:

I want to be nicer. Or something like that. I want to be a little less hostile, anyway...to the poor saps who start up conversations with me at bars and or at the grocery store, or the homeless guy who always waits outside of CVS asking for credit cards, for example. To cheery, commercial holidays and non-recyclers. To things I don't like, basically, and can't bear to deny the satisfaction of letting my big mouth have a say. To networking, crowded happy hours and meeting people. To making passing eye contact with a guy and having the retard think I'm saying,“I want you.” Really, now!

I want to be more open with my friends, let them in more and feel confident enough to let out more of my crazy insides. I want to give them more hugs. I want to tell them stories. Do you know that in the past I've been told,“I like you better when you're drunk"? Yeah, well, that's so not true! Anyway... there's nothing wrong knowing you're most you at the Big Hunt... it's a cool place.

I want to buy less stuff. Seriously, this is a problem. THINGS are costly, they pollute the world... they bog down my free nature and impressionable spirit! This also makes sense, since I don't have money. My insatiable thirst for all things pretty and hip may inevitably prove this daunting. But I'm so dead-set on making a dent in the amount of consumption happening in this world, people, that I'll do it looking like a worn-out floozy if I have to. I hope I have your support.

I want learn how to surf and play the guitar.

I want to obsess more about music. I want to shoot a documentary about day workers who wait at street corners, and their families. I want to live in Cuba. I want to learn Arabic instead of French.

I want to conserve more, waste less, and protest lousy politics.

I want to meditate every day and find some serious tranquility.

I want to stay jobless and make a living. I want to get into grad school. I want to finish my short documentary by July and have a rough draft of a feature film by December.

I think--THINK--I want to dive out of an airplane.

I want to know more about people, suck them in, read their minds and express camaraderie.

I want to read this post a year from now and realized how much I've changed, and still unbelievably find myself the same, as always. Strangely, it's how I'll know I'm on the right track.