My Second Bloggerversary!

JANUARY WALKING: EVENING PRAYER

shot and processed iPhone 3GS

JANUARY WALKING: OUT OF SIGNAL

shot and processed iPhone 3GS

On New Year's Day, we went for a stroll with a friend and became lost at the top of a rather cold, damp, Welsh hill. One session of Cognitive Behavioural Therapy isn't quite enough to get a severely anxious person through that kind of life-challenge without a considerable amount of panic, but as misty, evening darkness drew in around us, my thoughts turned to practical matters: would it be possible, I wondered, to fell a small tree with the edge of a Co-op loyalty card? Then we could construct a shelter. I wasn't so concerned about the cold for myself or my husband, but our friend does tend to moan a lot about the weather and I feared that at some point, during a night spent outdoors with him, we might loose the will to survive. I consoled myself with the thought that this was a very beautiful place in which to die of Hypothermia. My friend asked if I had the App that transforms the iPhone screen into a torchlight. Of course not! Why would I want that? Can I make pictures with it? Faced with the choice of saving my remaining phone battery power to make an SOS call or take more photographs, I chose the only logical course of action...I took more photographs...

Quite frankly, I haven't bounded into the new year full of vim and vigour, more like dragged myself, sluggishly, out of the old one, when I'd much rather have a nice long lie in. My conscience is grumbling: "it's 2011, the start of a new decade, that means you have to DO SOMETHING POSITIVE!" So, to show willing, I'm making lists...and I'm crossing things off...and I'm trying very hard not to mentally thrash myself if I haven't crossed EVERYTHING...or indeed, hardly anything, off the list, at the end of each day...let's see how long I can keep that up...

There's a lot that I want to accomplish over the next twelve months and now that I have a bright, shiny, new little garden studio to work in, what excuse can I possibly have? Well...the Panto Season may be coming to a close, but Mental Illness is like having a couple of Ugly Sisters permanently performing inside your head. They are not great company: Depression saps the imagination of its hopes and dreams. No sooner have you kicked her out the door than Anxiety comes knocking, nagging at you with countless reasons why hopes and dreams are bound to end in disaster. Before you know it, Depression has invited herself back in, put the kettle on and is eating her way through the chocolate HobNobs. Then there's The Cat...while we were away, just before Christmas and over the New Year, she had a little holiday at the vet's and so now I have a lot of making up to do. The Cat has an uncanny knack of knowing when I am just about to do something and at that precise moment, she desperately needs my lap and half an hour's reassurance that she is still the centre of my Universe. Whilst I'm in the midst of dealing with complex "nurturing issues", how can I possibly refuse?

Today marks my second bloggerversary. It's a cliche, I know, but it really does seem like only five minutes since I was writing my first bloggerversary post. Much has happened since then, but I have blogged about only a fraction of it. I've been away so from here for so long that this morning, I found it difficult to navigate my way around the dashboard and I've discovered an alarming number of half-composed postings in my drafts folder. However: I'm determined to complete this one, to thank visitors old and new for spending some time here and for your messages of support and encouragement over the past year. In the spirit of generosity that abounds in Blogland, I'm going to do the bloggerversary thing of offering a small gift as a token of my appreciation. Leave a message for me with this post and in about a week's time, I'll put everyone's name in a hat and pull one out. If your name is chosen, I'll send you a print of your choice from my Flickr Stream.

Wishing you all a very happy New Year!