a new year begins...

I love the start of a new year. For what it seems to do with my attitude. I tried explaining it in a post last New Year's Day. And I feel the same again this year. I feel this way every new year. Carl's post today sums up my feelings almost to a tee.

Anyway, I've spent the past few days, writing up lists of goals for the new year. ("Resolutions" just sounds too harsh, almost punitive, whereas "goals" sounds much more positive.) Now, being the obsessive list-maker that I am, these lists are quite extensive. I have 12 separate categories, ranging from health to homeschooling and crafts to Christmas. And of course, there's reading goals. Now, I wouldn't dream of boring you with my lists for all of these categories, but I will bore you with my reading goals...

As I was filling up page after page after page with these goals, big and small, it dawned on me that maybe one reason that I'm so addicted to reading challenges is that it gives me a chance to make yet more lists. And look, now I can even make a list of this year's challenges:

*finishing up the Four-Legged Friends Challenge
*finishing up the Unread Authors Challenge
*finishing up the Book Awards Challenge
*the What's in a Name? Challenge
*the Sci-Fi Experience
*the Graphic Novels Challenge
*the Decades Challenge 2008
*the Young Adult Challenge
*the Reading Full Circle Challenge
*the Tolkien/Lewis Challenge
*the Austen/Masterpiece Theater Challenge
*the Celebrate the Author Challenge
*the 1st in a Series Challenge
*the Hometown Challenge
*the Numbers Challenge
*the Mythopoeic Challenge
*the A-Z Challenge
*the Short Story Challenge

You know what...I almost wish I hadn't made that particular list! That is beyond daunting.

Anyway, using all my challenge lists as a guide, I made up a list of what I'd like to read during the month of January:

*finish up Alice in Sunderland by Bryan Talbot
*finish up The Cobra Event by Robert Preston
*Whittington by Alan Armstrong (Four-Legged Friends)
*The Mysterious Benedict Society by Trenton Lee Stewart (Unread Authors, Full Circle)
*Notes from a Small Island by Bill Bryson (Unread Authors)
*The Witch of Blackbird Pond by Elizabeth George Speare (Book Awards)
*The Stainless Steel Rat by Harry Harrison (1st in a Series, Sci-Fi)
*Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIHM by Robert C. O'Brien (Celebrate the Author)
*a Jane Austen book (Jane Austen/Masterpiece Theater)
*The Giver by Lois Lowry (Decades, homeschool)
*Alice's Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll (Decades)
*Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell (Numbers)
*Fever 1793 by Laurie Halse Anderson (YA)
*The Sandman: Preludes and Nocturnes by Neil Gaiman (Graphic Novels)
*War of the Worlds by H.G. Wells(Sci-Fi)
*start The Fellowship of the Ring by J.R.R. Tolkein (Tolkien/Lewis)
*Grimms Fairy Tales (homeschool)
*The Brief History of the Dead by Kevin Brockmeier (just because)
*Horns & Wrinkles by Joseph Helgerson (just because)
*The Wolves in the Walls by Neil Gaiman (just because)
*Double Cross by James Patterson (just because)

I know, I know, absolutely ludicrous! I'll be lucky to get a quarter of that list read. So, I'll just call that my pool of books to choose from for January's reading. Yeah, that sounds better, huh?

Hmmm...just think how much I could have gotten read in the time I just spent rambling on here...

What is it about a new year beginning?

There's something about the start of a new year.

It always fills me with such optimism. Like I can conquer the world. Or at least the endless clutter and piles of laundry. I'm confident that I can tackle projects big and small, and actually complete them. I even envision myself making minor dents in bad habits.

Why does this always happen with the start of a new year? My brain truly does know better. It knows that January 1st is simply another day. There's nothing magic about it.

Or is there? For whatever reason, it does seem to sprinkle my psyche with magical images of what life might have in store. At this time of year, even that pessimistic little voice which seems to think it has a monopoly on reason, can't get a total hold on me. Sooner or later, it will. At least it always has in the past. But until then, I'm going to enjoy my illusions...

And who knows-maybe this will be the year my illusions become reality.