Auld lang syne.
As is my tradition, I'm spending New Year's Eve wrapping up reflections on the year that's leaving and getting ready to welcome the year ahead.
(This has my tradition since long before I stopped drinking for good. New Year’s Eve revelry always seemed to be a setup for shattered expectations. And I decided many, many NYEs ago that it was much more enjoyable to go to bed early on the last day of the year so I could wake up and greet the new one bright and early.)
2023 wasn’t the year I thought it would be. (They seldom are.)
Daily life in India took more bandwidth—emotionally, physically, mentally—than I had originally accounted for in my planning. I didn’t figure we’d be pulling Nicolas from local playschool in January and re-acclimating him to a new school in February. Or that I’d get Dengue Fever that would knock me out for most of September. Or that there would be a million other ways that life in Delhi took up so much more energy than the life I might be living in the States.
Which isn’t to say it’s been bad. It hasn’t. Just… not what I thought it’d be.
I honestly thought I'd feel more rooted this, a non-PCS, year. (In fact, that was my word of the year for my coaching business.) I figured that since we weren’t moving or living out of suitcases while we waited for household goods to arrive, I’d somehow feel more settled.
In many ways I did. We had been here for almost six months by the time 2023 rolled in. We had our stuff and our art was even up on the walls. We had found and survived the probationary period with an amazing nanny/all-rounder after an unsuccessful trial with another. I had (mostly) gotten the hang of getting around town. And I had made a couple of connections that felt like they could become friends.
But it still ended up being a year where I felt like I was trying to get my feet underneath me almost as often as I felt the firmness of the ground below me.
Maybe it was the six-week Home Leave back to the States this summer. Being back “home” is good and easy and challenging all at the same time. It’s hard to maintain any semblance of routine bouncing from city to city to see loved ones. And we were only back in Delhi a few weeks before that fateful mosquito bite.
They say Dengue recovery can come with some minor depression and I wonder if that’s been part of the reason I’ve struggled a little more than normal this Fall. Or maybe I’ve just needed the extra rest.
When I started my year-end reflections a week ago, it felt like I was still somewhat in the fog. But clarity often comes in the form of a warm cup of tea, journaling prompts, and a pen.
2023 wasn’t the year I though it would be. I didn’t tick everything off my list and some dreams had to be deferred. But it was still a good year:
I read 20 books. My Goodreads goal was 15 and even that had felt ambitious for a preschool mom.
I earned my ACC credential from the Int’l Coaching Federation. (And passed a test that would have been gnarly under even good circumstances, let alone the hilarity that was a testing center in the middle of Munirka.)
I completed a 10-week training for trauma-informed space-holding.
I coached some amazing clients and got to witness amazing courage, tenacity, and growth.
I got through a lengthy hiring process and onboarded as a part-time Training Instructor with the Foreign Service Institute.
I learned how to listen when my body said it needed rest.
I practiced leaning into moments of joy, no matter how small.
I volunteered first as a small group mentor and then a coordinator/admin with Seven Cities.
I ran an in-person workshop and two virtual workshops for other EFMs.
I got to my yoga mat way, way more than I have in the past few years and felt supported by amazing instructors and community.
We hosted another expat family for their first Thanksgiving experience.
We traveled to Tokyo and Hyderabad.
I’m wrapping up the year knowing that while I didn’t show up perfectly, I did pretty OK most of the time.
So what will 2024 hold? Who knows?!
Only tomorrow will tell…
