Week 50/2022: The end of what?

Week of 12 December 2022

The end of what?

I’m getting that end of year exhaustion thing that seems to strike in early December where people (or is it just me?) start to think the end of the year is looming, so there’s not much point in starting anything new or even progressing anything any further. And while, when this feeling hits, there’s still several weeks before the holidays, it feels like there’s a finish line I’m limping towards, and things are just grinding to a halt.

The finish line of what, I don’t exactly know because nothing’s going to magically change when the calendar ticks over to 1 January 2023.

I’ll still have to do my shoulder exercises and get more sleep. I’ll still be wondering how I’m ever going to get time to do everything I want to do. (Answer: I won’t.)

Climate change isn’t going away, covid and its long-term complications aren’t going away (and if you look at China, the fallout is very probably going to get a lot worse than it already is), and Rupert Murdoch’s media empire isn’t going to disappear in a puff of smoke at the stroke of midnight.

Yet still I feel like an ending and a new beginning is approaching, even though the end of the year is just another day. The sun will rise and set, the tide will come in, and the birds will sing.

It’s a bit like having great plans for a new week that fall apart by Tuesday (or Wednesday if I’m lucky) because it wasn’t really a new start and anything that needed to change to put those plans into action didn’t change. The end of the year is like the end of a week but on a bigger scale.

Anyway, I’m tired and I get an enforced week off work, so that at least is something to look forward to.

But there is an end

The end of 2022 actually is an end in one sense, as Kramstable comes to the end of his high school life.

After eight long years in primary school where I felt connected and involved with his school life, four years of high school where the approach is much more hands-off (because who wants their parent sticking their nose into everything you do, right?) has gone in a flash. He had his final two days of his school musical earlier in the week and then it was time to get ready for the Year 10 formal on Friday. What happened I’ll never know.I just got to pay for the suit, shoes and ticket and in return was allowed to take some photos before he disappeared with his friends into what I’m told was a wonderful evening.

It feels sad because his best friends, who he’s known since Grade One, won’t be at the same college next year.

But, as I keep reminding myself, these are his endings not mine.

A (mostly) exciting week

I had a terrible day on Tuesday cleaning my mother’s flat. It rained in the afternoon and I got completely soaked on my ride home. It was most unpleasant.

On Thursday I got the very exciting news that not one but two of my photos of the Clarence City Council Chambers had been picked as winners in the Open House Hobart photo competition and I’d won a wooden blanket and a pair of Blundstone boots. Much excitement!

Then on Friday, more excitement! My new macro lens, which I ordered three weeks ago and have been relentlessly tracking on the Australia Post app, finally arrived so I could go out and experience the joy (and complications) of macro photography on the weekend.

So I had fun!

22 for 2022 update

Being realistic, I’m not going to get to anything else on my list because, yet again, I overestimated what I could do and also I did a lot of other things that took time but weren’t on the list.

I’m continuing the Dymocks Reading Challenge (thing 21).

22 for 2022 summary

• Things completed to date: 9 (8, 10, 11, 13, 17, 18, 19, 20, 22)
• Things completed this week:
• Things I worked on this week: 1 (21)
• Things in progress: 7 (1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 12, 21)
• Things not started: 2 (14, 16)
• Things I’m not going to do: 4 (4, 7, 9, 15)

What do I want to do next week?

My shoulder exercises. Organise Christmas lunch. Attend Kramstable’s final assembly and take a photo of him and his best friends on his last day of school. Practise using the macro lens.

Weekly summary

What was the best thing about this week?

Winning the photo competition was up there in the excitement stakes. I also appreciated the chance to photograph Kramstable before his formal.

What did I learn this week?

You need to get sunlight in your eyes first thing in the morning to reset your body rhythms after sleep. Something like that. I need to rewatch the video.

What did I notice this week?

Agapanthus.

I also noticed that the people who seem hell-bent on getting a cable car on kunanyi/Mt Wellington, despite the planning tribunal rejecting the development application, rarely, if ever, refer to the Mountain as kunanyi. kunanyi is its name in palawa kani, the Tasmanian Aboriginal language and is an officially gazetted name. But to the cable car seekers that have been recently speaking up in the media, it’s always “Mt Wellington” to them.

Just an observation.

What I’m reading this week

• The Little Red Writing Book by Mark Tredinnick
• Tranquility by Tuesday by Laura Vanderkam
• The Science of Storytelling by Will Storr
• Sixty Seven Days by Yvonne Weldon
• You Are A Badass by Jen Sincero

Habit tracker

• Morning ritual (Goal = 7): 6
• Move (preferably before 3 pm) (Goal = 7): 7
• Morning writing (Goal = 7): 7
• The Little Red Writing Book exercises (Goal = 5): 0
• Listened to writing podcasts (Goal = 2): 0
• Controlled breathing (Goal = 7): 7
• All six physiotherapy exercises (Goal = 7): 0
• Mental health break outside during my work days in the office (2 days): 2
• Finish work by 5.30 (Goal = 4): 4
• Shut my computer down before 9.15 (Goal = 6): 4