There are a few hearty souls on my Facebook feed that have enthusiastically started their New Year's Resolutions.
As often is the case with enthusiastic people, they are understandably proud of their achievements and celebrate their achievements by posting a lot of happy looking photos of themselves proudly achieving something.
My ambitious friends are posting things like "I ran 5km today" and "I'm going to do a marathon this year" or "I'm going to travel to an unpronounceable country to do charity work in return for the right to sleep in a hut."
My own status updates are rarely interesting and often have something to do with how much sleep I haven't had. That being said, I am, and remain, interested in other people's ambition. Rather than be disappointed in current lack of big-life goals, I prefer to have a manageable checklist of items that I could possibly complete. Things like, "I slept for four hours - in a row!" and "got out of the house on time -mostly" or "remembered to sign a permission form."
There are people who are training for marathons that are running outside in the middle of a cold snap in the wilds of the frozen North.Not only are these people disgustingly motivated but they are legitimately hard-core. Way more hard-core than me.
The closest I have come to being really hard-core was that I worked in downtown Prince George for a year back when there were hardly any shops.Then there was that one time I worked at the pulp mill as a summer student.My pulp mill stories impressed my Victoria friends but they really don't hold any weight when compared to the brave souls who plunge into the icy depths of Ness Lake in the annual Polar Bear Dip on New Year's Day.That is extreme northern hardiness and I do not have that. In winter, I would like it to be a nice -5 degrees outside and sunny.There should be a nice base for all the ski hills around the area and fresh powder to play in.There should also be three good snowfalls with good snowman-building snow - not this dry snow that puffs around rather than sticking together making a mockery of your earnest attempt to impress your children with your snowman-making skills.
My current New Year's Resolutions at this time have been all downgraded into one brief mantra: stay warm and try not to go outside. In the meantime, I am becoming more genuine in my admiration of my friends of the go-getting variety and I hope that my friends are as excited for me when I have successfully slept through the night.
