A Brand New Year

Happy New Year, Dear climbers of my beanstalk! If you’ve been wondering where the heck I’ve been of late, I took a nasty fall Christmas night. It happens lately more often than not, and I did a number on myself. The only time I’m thankful for the extra "padding" I’ve got is when I take these tumbles. I wasn’t hurt too terribly, unless you count a dented spot in said padding and an incredibly bruised ego! It reminds me of a tongue-in-cheek conversation between me and a colleague several years back. One day, I walked into work in an ankle cast and sporting a cane.
"Walk much?" Darwin asked, taking a sip of coffee, looking over the worse-for-wear me.
"Yeah," I sighed. "But, apparently I don’t have it down pat yet, because I don’t seem to do it very well!"
Who knew it would turn out to be so prophetic? Tumbling Jhill. That’s me...just like the nursery rhyme states. My crown, however, is still in tact! [One point goes in the score column for me!]
At this point, I imagine some of you are thinking "Stay off the sauce, Girl!" I wish that was the answer–that I could blame it on too much sauce. Aside from the occasional cup of coffee, and a bottled water here and there, my drink of choice is the house wine of the south: iced tea with lemon. In other words, I don’t drink. Well, except for Evan Williams Southern Eggnog at Christmas, but that’s a story for another day.
Back to my point, the fall. I’m on medication, I’ve felt like crap for three weeks and not in the mood to sit on my injury and reflect about anything other than how much it hurts to sit on my injury. Between the physical therapy and the pain meds, mainly the pain meds, [my brother suggested that I stay off the "stalk" for awhile] I’ve not been in much shape or mind-set to write. Think loopy mind and nonsensical thoughts. Does that paint a clear picture? If not, plain and simple: Cat in the Hat books for me right now would be akin to reading Anna Karenina. Let me just say, before I go any further, both are enjoyable and brilliant in its own right, but you have to be on your toes to understand and appreciate those qualities about them, and I’m not. Half of my toes are connected to one of my legs that feeds into half of my trunk that was recently dented. So, being on my toes doesn’t work for me right now.
I can hear my brother, in my head, telling me to stop now because I’ve boarded a train that doesn’t appear to be going anywhere. That’s a valid point. Here’s another: who cares about the destination? Sometimes, it’s all about the ride. Train rides are good in and of themselves. I hope you’ll find this one/ride will measure up to that standard, if nothing else.
So, a New Year is upon us! Goodness. 13 days in already. Is it just me or does time seem to pass at the speed of light the older you get? I swear, it seems like just yesterday that the dawning of 2011 was being celebrated. Yet, here we are: 13 days into a brand new year!  FRIDAY, January the 13^th, mind you.
I know there are some people out there for whom this is a troubling day. They don’t like Fridays that are attached to a 13. They don’t venture out; they throw salt over their shoulder and steer clear of black cats on this day. Not me. Friday the 13^th days make me giddy. It’s a lucky day for me. [I hear you jokesters out there thinking: as long as you don’t walk around! HA! Stop it! ;-) ] Geez, suddenly images of Rodney Dangerfield are in my mind, hearing his lamentation of getting no respect. Hm. I get that. My own mother concludes our conversations lately by saying, "Stay off the floor!" My husband is threatening to order me a bubble, AND I think a dear friend of mine is actually preparing to send me one.
For those of you, at this point, who are thinking my brother was right and want me to stop this train so that you can get off, too late. We’ve already left the station. Anchor yourself to the chair and hang on. It won’t be much longer, and I promise there’s a point to be made here, even if we’re taking the scenic view or the long way around, depending on whether you’re a glass half full or half empty person.
Okay. Let me get my bearings breath ....New Year-13 days in. Got it. Wow! I’ve missed SO much that I wanted to write-talk about. Stories, I suppose, for another day, and trust me when I tell you that I’ll get to each and every one. I’m bummed that I missed what I’d planned to write for New Year’s day or the entry I was thinking about on what would have been Elvis’ 77^th birthday. Warning: Train’s going around a curve, i.e. Sidebar: What’s your favorite Elvis movie? How about song?
Two true stories involving Elvis. Back in the 70's they use to have a movie of the week. It came on Tuesday night/ABC. Most of the time, I think they were "Made for TV movies" but one night, they showed an Elvis movie. My sister and I were in heaven, until the network interrupted regular broadcasting for some breaking news story. Can you imagine? It may have been important news, I don’t recall. In my upset frame of mind, I highly doubted it. [Sometimes, with some of the things they interrupt tv with, and how long they drag it out, then discuss it over and over ad nauseam, it makes you wonder if it was REALLY necessary to break in versus waiting for the evening news...] Still, nothing was more important to my sister or me that evening than seeing Roustabout. It didn’t matter that we’d seen it a half a dozen times. It was Elvis Presley and Barbara Stanwyck. WHAT could be more important than that? We were in such a state of upset uproar that my mother promised we could stay up past our bedtime to watch it, so long as we didn’t grumpily protest when the alarm went off the next morning. So, it worked out in the end and all was well.
The other Elvis story didn’t end so well. It was the summer of 1977, and we were driving up to Virginia from Florida to see our grandparents. August to be exact. My birthday was on the 13^th and my grandmother’s was on the 16^th. We were going to visit and to celebrate.
So, we’re driving up I-95, and we pass a billboard that had a date listed in late August in South Carolina. The picture on the billboard was of Elvis Presley, and the happening was a concert. Just as we drove by that billboard, the radio announcer came on to inform the listening audience of the tragic death of a race car driver who’d hit the wall at the racetrack and had been taken to the hospital only to be pronounced DOA. Out of the blue, my brother made an off-the-cuff comment.
"Man, the world will freak out when Elvis dies."
"Jeff!" we all chimed in, horrified by that thought.
"What?" he shot back in typical guy, non-horrified form. "I’m just saying...."
Yeah. He said it alright.
I will never forget sitting at the table in my grandparents kitchen, having just finished a delicious piece of my grandmother’s birthday cake, when the news announcer broke into regular programming to announce that the King of Rock and Roll had died earlier that day. A dozen eyes shot wide open as if we couldn’t have possibly heard correctly. My sister and I went flying into the den with my mother, brother and grandparents close on our heels as we stood there and listened to that awful, awful truth being relayed. Mouths were agape and tears were shed. How in the world could that be true? I remember shaking my head rapidly against the words that I was hearing. It couldn’t be true! It couldn’t be true! It couldn’t be true! Yet, it was.
I remember giving a pouty-mad look in the direction of my brother, as if HE was the reason for what we were hearing.
"Man...." he said in a drawn-out, disbelieving tone.
Man was right. Man oh man!
It was the news for days and weeks that followed. It was a weird feeling, on the drive home, to pass by that billboard in South Carolina that boasted of an event that would never happen.
Which brings me to my point for today’s post: [You thought I’d lost it, didn’t you?]
A new year is upon us. It’s a chance to do those things that we let slip by in the previous year. It’s an opportunity to try and reach a goal that we set for ourselves that somehow never materialized. It’s a clean slat and a new beginning. It only happens once in the year, when the world collectively says that we all have a new day, month and year to try and do better and be better than we did and were the previous year.  Every minute we are given is a blessing.  We never know when our time on this earth is scheduled to run out.  So, live your life every day you are given to the fullest you are able, but challenge yourself to stretch one armlength beyond that which you are living toward another dawn that is better and brighter than the one you're presently in.  In other words, every moment of your life, strive to be a little better than you were, because when you're speaking about life, seconds matter-split seconds.  It's one of a few instances when they truly do.
That’s good food for thought. It’s a good resolution to make, if you make them.
I’ve stopped making specific resolutions, because I find that they’re nothing more than a set-up for feeling bad about ourselves if we break them or don’t meet them. I no longer say "fail at them", because I’ve lived long enough to know, after careful thought and consideration, that there is really no such thing as failure. More to the point, as Susan B. Anthony once said, "Failure is impossible!"
Think about that for a second...
I remember the first time I read that statement, that’s exactly what I did: I thought about it – a lot. I considered all the angles of such a grand statement and came to the conclusion that she was exactly right. Failure IS impossible, because here’s the thing: if you fail at something, it means that you tried. You never learn anything unless you try. Being unsuccessful when we try at something doesn’t mean we failed. It simply means that we didn’t make it to where we wanted to go the first time we dared to step out and reach for something beyond ourselves and our safety zones. That’s not failure. That’s learning. When you learn, you know, and when you know, you grow. When you grow, then you become something more amazing than what you already are.
So, as we embark on a new year, my message to you today is to seize whatever it is you want for yourself! Carpe Diem! Seize the day! Don’t be afraid of it! Dare to live it and have fun in the "trying" to achieve what your heart desires. It you don’t make it the first time, brush yourself off and try again. If you carry it over into the new year, just keep plugging away at it. You’ll get there...eventually. Have faith and be patient. The point to all of this – this thing called life is to enjoy the ride so that, [as a cartoon I once read said] when you reach the end of your life, hopefully with a Hershey bar in one hand and a chocolate milkshake in the other, you can smile at God when you reach those pearly gates and say "YAHOO!!! What a ride!"
I wish you your BEST year to date, filled with good health, extreme laughter, great prosperity and love that knows no bounds!
Happy New Year everybody, and God Bless Us everyone!
Upward and onward...

http://youtu.be/m9saX9cF248 [American Trilogy/MY favorite Elvis song]
My favorite Elvis movie [in case you’re curious] is Blue Hawaii