On the First Day of the Year

With a little regret and a gentle hand, I have been begun to go through the accumulated trappings and detritus of year 2007, as I always do on the first day of the new year - I am looking once more through papers and memorabilia gathered along the way: journals, notebooks, almanacs, daytimers, bits of paper, drawings and sketches, greeting cards and old envelopes.

Born packrat and occasional collage artist that I am, it is tempting to keep absolutely everything, but some of these cherished bits and pieces will have to embrace the void - there is simply no room in the little blue house for all the quotidian elements of a life this long and a road this winding, curious and thoughtful. There are sadnesses sprinkled here and there, but there is richness and color too, friendship and companionship and wildness to be treasured - here an oak leaf, there an acorn, a pine cone, a few pebbles, a scrap of birch bark or a gnarled piece of wood from my favorite grove, a very bad drawing of a beech leaf hastily rendered on the back of a receipt from the local general store.

I touch these things gently and assign them places. I say goodbye when absolutely necessary, and I thank them for being with me on this journey. Then I wrap them up and tuck them away before lifting out the calendars, blank artist books and journals which will accompany me on my pottering in 2008. Two of the new companions were gifts, and a handful were purchased in a local artist's supply store (Loomis and Toles). I purchased one sensible item to help me get myself organized, an exercise in futility if there ever was one, and a few of the lovelier ones actually came from an Asian themed bargain shop in the village. There is page after blank page of of lovely thick creamy paper, binding and fragrance, so many memories in the making. New Moleskines and sketchbooks await and rapido pens with inks of red and emerald, peacock and purple.

Resolutions this year??? Nary a one except to continue on as I have begun...