2013 - The Year of the Snake, the Black Snake. The snake who will hopefully have a little mercy on this enthusiastic, yet misguided, dragon.
Normally, I just live the Chinese New Year vicariously through my older brother who gets to experience it firsthand. Yeah, my awesome older brother lives in China. No biggie. This year, I wanted to celebrate it myself. Maybe this isn't exactly celebrating in the traditional sense, but I am acknowledging the fresh start and the chance to make the Year of the Black Snake my own.
(And I think it just sounds better than 2013 too. "I'm going to kick ass in the Year of the Black Snake" vs "I'm going to kick 2013's ass". Yes, I will take the snake symbolism, please.)
Let's recap. Early in the day, December 31, 2012, I posted a Facebook status gushing about how 2013 will be my best year yet. So hopeful, I was! And then something or nothing happened. I don't know. Later that night, I was a diving head first into the dark hole I had spent the past 5 months clawing, bleeding and crying, my way up. Less than two weeks into 2013, I would be checking myself into a locked psychiatric unit, avoiding eye contact with the imaginary faces of disappointment on the real people who pulled me up when I forgot to keep clawing.
I repeated this cycle once more before the end of January. Crawl up. Reach for hope. Slipping. Oh, shit. Hospital. Fuck.
It's scary how I can go from hopeful to hospital in a matter of days. It's scary that it happened twice in one month and scary that I am not confident it won't happen again in February. But I have learned something between my first New Year's celebration I cried through and the Chinese one tonight: going to the hospital is not as scary as not going to the hospital. Had I lacked the balls to pack my bags and spend a week at Aurora, Boyfriend would probably be packing up the rest of my belongings to donate to charity, or whatever it is the boyfriend does with the girlfriend's stuff when she swallows 348.5 pills.
I don't regret what happened during the first month of the year. It was something that needed to happen and was probably a long time coming. But I am ready to start fresh. This beginning, February 10, lets me do just that only this time with one hell of a solid plan, not undefined delusions of grandeur.
I have resources in the community that I can turn to.
I have self-help books that I have faith in.
I am enrolled in a class that will teach me more about myself and others like me.
I have a job lined up in the field.
I have lists upon lists of actions I can take to avoid breakdowns.
I have hope that comes from inside myself.
I could go on. But I don't want to. I want to finish my wine, maybe get one more celebratory glass, and write in my trusty journal. (Yes, I do write things that the whole world isn't allowed to see.) But first, Happy Chinese New Year, everyone!! To all of those who fucked up January, here's your guilt-free opportunity to start over. Or eat egg rolls.
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