January 1, 2009

The sun is setting on the first day of 2009. Kali is happily whispering to herself in the front room, clothed in her tutu and an apron. Dough for bagels is rising and will soon need our attention to shape and decorate. It's been a good first day of the year and a special end to 2008, spent with close friends Mark, Wendy and 1 year old Isaac. We last spent New Year's Eve with them 5 years ago when Kali was just over 4 months old and Isaac a future dream. I remember falling asleep before midnight with Kali sacked out on my chest.

Kali has been one big ball of anticipation during the holidays this year. New Year's Eve was no exception and she was not about to find herself dozing before toasting in the New Year! In the afternoon she picked out a fancy dress she wanted to wear. When I suggested she might like to wear something more comfortable since we would just be at home, she quickly corrected me that she wanted to be fancy because, after all, we were having a party that evening. She lasted until about 1am when her eyelids could not manage to stay open any longer to read the Christmas stories she was flipping through.

She was very clear with us at midnight that she would not be toasting with wine. Instead her little wine glass had an M & M in it at one point, and a cookie at another. Her toast to the New Year was a hope that we will make macaroni and cheese more often in 2009. She wanted to know mine. Not wanting to plunge to too great a depth of thoughtfulness after her contribution I mentioned three of my hopes for 2009: that we take more family walks together, get chickens and go camping.

Today 2/3 of our family went for a walk. Jason was working for Samuel so Kali and I ventured out. For fun we took our camera along and took pictures of our first walk in 2009. It has the potential to be a fun new tradition. We each took some pictures (you can guess the photographer on each). They are online at http://picasaweb.google.com/bennerj8/NewYearSDay# with a few captions attached.

...We've savored fresh homemade bagels, Kali is once again fully dressed and we have just completed our family meeting for the evening. I shared one more resolution/goal/dream for the New Year. Sometime this year I want to have another weekend with just Kali. I would also like a long weekend with Jason sometime around our 10th anniversary in mid-May and the one year anniversary of Nora's death in early June. Connected to that, or separate, I hope to spend at least one full day in retreat alone to continue processing the events of 2007 and 2008, as well as dreaming into the future.