I thought my word of 2020 would be acceptance – as in accepting the things I cannot change, and changing the things I cannot accept – but it fell flat somewhere. That’s a tall order for a year, much less a lifetime, and especially for a near future filled with dying koalas and dying humans and so much unrest and destruction and misunderstanding. I cannot. I just cannot.
My word is actually “Drive,” you see. It doesn’t have to change the world, not in a year, but let’s see what we can do. Life sometimes, is so tedious. It’s in the amount of time it takes to dry your hair. Waiting for the waves of a broken heart to recede, or even the fires of a broken stomach to burn through to just a smoky echo. It’s slipping on the ice layers on the driveway, again, and nearly submitting an Instagram draft that took you four hours – only to realize they asked for text overlay for each individual photo. And you’re in for another four hours of frustrating work.
It’s when he asks the same questions, again and again, and she needs the same tuck-in, again and again, even though you’re cluttered and clustered under three blankets and two pets – deep into dreams of tidal waves and fire; rickety boats and rescues. Terror, relief, desire, despair.
You wake up with a cold gasp. The stove is out of pellets again, and anyway, sometimes it’s hard to face yourself in the mirror. Terror, relief, desire, despair – writing itself in lines across your face.
Watched minutes, boiling pots, and conscious breathing – it all trips me up. What if you could feel time turning? Seconds and minutes drawn in and out like a breath. What if you couldn’t exhale into the moments – couldn’t let them all blur together, not too fast, not too slowly? What if you watched the lines deepen and the age spots fill in? Watched the colors fill in the shapes – sometimes in the lines and sometimes outside the lines – color by color by depth by dimension.
If you look too far behind you, you’re stuck in the thickness – like your van’s tires through ice and mud. If you look too far ahead of you, you’ll be watching every second, minute, hour, day, month, year that propels you forward. Drive doesn’t push you forward too fast, in fact. It gets you lost in the moments so you don’t watch them tick by. Not another line on the prison wall, and notch on your belt. Blurs and swirls and twirls of color. That’s what gets you to where you’re going – out of order and askew – many steps forward, and many steps back. Yet, it’s still in the right direction.
I sometimes get concerned by how anyone does anything with what they’re given, what they’ve got, what they’re fighting against and for, and for how long they’ve been fighting. I get concerned about myself. Some of us have anxiety – crippling and choking at times – and settled and sleeping at others. Some of us have depression – from different causes and with different degrees and durations. And some of us have both, or neither. Some of our quirks and obstacles are superpowers, and some aren’t. What is it that moves us forward – and makes time tick by unknown and unwatched? What lets the lines write their own deepening stories on our faces?
It’s like I said above. I get concerned by how anyone does anything with what they’re given, what they’ve got, what they’re fighting against and for, and how long they’ve fought, because, as I said, I get concerned by how I do so. It depends on my drive; my drives. These waves and patterns pressing down on my skin – not line by line – but etched and sketched and branded and burning. Burning within me, and without me, and yet I love to trace each color and line.
Drive is what keeps you searching – the lighthouse in your series of storms. Drive is what keeps you pacing yourself – falling into breaths and rhythms so steady and unique to you – that it’s ok when you stop having to move them along. They are you, and you are them, and the world goes by in a beautiful, colorful blur. It’s not too fast; not too slow. You’re not too fast; not too slow.
Drive is what keeps you steadier on the ice – day after day for over three months of every year. Drive helps you build bridges and ramps, over rising waters and waves and rocks and canyons, and maybe drive is what helps you settle into a different place – so steady and unique to you.
And drive is what helps you write the notes to the songs, and the words on the letters to the people you love – in all the ways you love every person in your life that you love. In all of the familiar and unexpected ways – safe and sound and connected. Complex, and never fragile.
Drive is what keeps me here on this blog, (nearly ten years in) and it’s also what keeps me here – searching and growing and surviving and thriving. It’s in the off beats, the drumbeats, the heartbeats, and the steady and unique rhythms – subtly drowning out the ticking of the clock.
When you shake?
Who’s gonna come around
When you break?”
I’m linking up with Finish The Sentence Friday (FTSF) for another fun and challenging prompt. This week’s topic is “My word for 2020 is..” There’s time to write yours. Link up your post HERE.
Omg, if anyone has the drive is so you, my friend. I mean you are truly my hero for blogging and just in life in general how you always seem to keep on keeping on and never seem to give up! Hugs and here is to the best 2020 yet to come <3
Same with you! You are just like me, my dear.
Drive is you and your siblings; it’s the lost love I’ve mourned that I’ve honored by raising you the best that I could. It’s the hugs from grandchildren and the sparkle in their eyes. It’s the appreciation from you when
I can be of help. It’s the horseback rides, the art, the teaching that I do. It’s the having you when there’s a hole in my heart that will take time to fill in with all the love in my life.
Sounds like it’s your word of the century! Love you!
You inspire me with your courage and vulnerability. Drive is a wonderful word for the year. I hope it allows you to move in wonderful directions and onto surprisingly beautiful pathways in 20201
I think my word of the year once was “Vulnerable.” Or maybe it wasn’t, but I’ve been certainly working on that now for years. I remember when I figured out it was the right path for me, but it’s been a rocky one since then.
I appreciate you and your words so much!
I have chills. Never stop doing this thing that you do. The way you open the door for everybody to see inside is magical and brave. Also, so many people in the world need to see that behind a life that looks perfect we are all still human. Your willingness to be vulnerable to the world makes you even more beautiful.
Sometimes, or often, I worry I am losing it. Or that it’s long gone. It’s the changing world of media and blogging and my silly brain.
This comment makes me happy beyond.
This IS my tenth year. I hope to be more present on my blog but that’s one I won’t make a promise on – with the unrest of everything, sometimes I cannot. Your word is perfect. I feel like it’s already there for you, all you have to do is keep going!
Side note: Are all those the same beaches above or different times and places?
It is so awesome to see you here (and at FTSF) again, fellow longtermer!
I love your side notes always! Remember the one about the Photoshopped moon? So here, they’re all the same two day period and all Truro in Cape Cod, but the day ones are the beach (ocean side), and the night ones are the bay. Ahhh! The more you know.
This Grammy Award winning song with its clever, and nicely done video featuring Ric Ocasek and his future wife were memorable highlights of the mid 80’s peak years of MTV. I’m driven too for many reasons. Drive helps me push through many obstacles. Drive is your word not only mentally, but even more so physically! Bulldoze would be another great word for you Tamara!
1984, Eddie! Of course I don’t remember it coming out, but I remember it at many other parts of life.
Drive is a pretty amazing word when I think about all of us and what we do with what we do.
I think about that too all of the time! How do people get done what they get done with what they have been given? Sometimes it feels inadequately small for some people I see struggling to get the basics, especially when I feel like I have so much. I like the word drive. This last year I grew my PR business for local clients and it has been so HUGE for my family. I just added another big client yesterday. I am still blogging, because it relaxes me, but my drive there is just that, and no longer (for a long time) am I focused on keeping up with others. Sometimes we feel driven in opposite areas from other people anyways, right? And that is the beauty I think. Drive that road that fills you the most and blesses your family the best like a crazy person I say!
I like that blogging relaxes you. It both stirs me and relaxes me, depending on what I’m writing. And what day it is! My Friday posts relax me the most but also drive me crazy, which seems unfair, because they’re not the paid ones! They’re just the most ME.
I love that we relate on thinking about how do what they do.
I love the word you chose, Tamara. I love that it has multiple meanings and layers, and that you explored all of that in this post. I’m not sure where I’m going in 2020, but I know we’ll both get to where we need to be.
Oh, I do hope you’re right! It’s a weird-seeming future.
I love that this song that was mostly only in the depths of my brain is now playing in the front, because of your words. It’s such an amazing song and reminds me of how much music lives in my pasts and my hard drives and how little of it is on my phone’s playlist for the car. Thank you for the reminder. I love the word “Drive” for the year. You’re amazing and a true inspiration in blogging. Ten years. I’m on seven now and can hardly believe it really.
UGH to the four hours of IG readiness and then realizing you have to go back. That’s the worst feeling (I don’t have it for IG posts but do this often with my work-related projects). Love your words so much, and that we’re friends because of blogging.
You know what’s funny (not really haha but interesting and weird) is that I didn’t know how much anxiety I actually have until I started therapy last year. I’m glad for you that you have known this about yourself and that your power of writing has such a lovely ability to express it, drive forward from it, and even step back. I thank you for this, friend.
I think some things get worse before better. Or maybe rising up to meet that anxiety, that you didn’t know you even have, is somehow productive. First step is admitting it! Even if you didn’t know it was there – it was there.
I have not been in therapy for some time (she retired) but lately I think I need someone to talk to about the things I can’t really talk to my family and friends about. Not like.. a secret identity or robbing banks or having an affair or anything – but of some pain I can’t work though well on my own.
I adore you!
This post gave me goosebumps, Tamara. Also ever since I saw this post on Facebook the other day, I’ve had this beautiful and haunting song stuck in my head. It’s not one I hear every day, if ever really, and it kind of doesn’t want to leave once it’s in there. That’s okay—I I welcome it.
The world is a lot to handle right now and sometimes it does seem like we are up against a lot. And for empaths like us, those moles when the world is extra fragile and broken coupled with our own anxiety and depression—it’s a feat when we even make it out of bed. We don’t give ourselves credit often though. You know?
I love your word for the year and think it suits you perfectly. And I’m excited for the open road that is your life in 2020 and all that is on the surface for you.
This song is a real thing with me.
And I agree – about the giving ourselves credit thing. I have long tried to write about having anxiety and sensitivities, and trying to wrap those around the craziness of the world. Or negotiate them against it. I think sometimes of the “good ole days” – like 2004, when there was really no social media and all the recent three years’ battles. And of course, the world is always crazy and calm, crazy and calm, and humans can really suck. We’re never really safe. Lately, though, it seems REALLY hard to tell the kids that a second Holocaust isn’t going to happen, and that this planet is plenty safe. Really hard.
Our kids, though. Maybe they’re the ones to change it.
First of all, I love that song and will now have it on replay in my head for the rest of the day!
This was, as always, so deep and revealing and thought-provoking, Tamara!
I love your word and how you detailed it so vividly here with so many layers and so many blends of colorful views into its meaning. It’s perfect.
It’s funny how you never think you’ll be able to narrow it down to just one word, because how could anyone, but then it happens. That is THE word for my January, and my life.
Adore you, as always!