First Rule of Resolutions: Keep Them.

I have a twenty times rule. By this I mean that if I am doing crafts where I need to hold a piece of glued paper down with my fingers to ensure maximum stickiness, I count to 20 Mississippis. When I tried to train my dog to give me her paw, I tried it 20 times in a row before I went about my day and returned to see if she remembered the lesson.

This all comes from some commercial or other that told a young, impressionable Georgette that you had to do something twenty-times before it becomes habit, like going to the gym or putting your car keys on the ring by the door. That’s just how we make things normal and less tiresome, I suppose.

Get it? Because Sister Act 2 was Back in the Habit?

Which is why I can’t understand why I’m awful at New Year’s resolutions. Consider I’m 24 years old. You would think that I would be in the habit of making resolutions and sticking to them. Of course that is assuming I started making resolutions right out of the gate . . .

Okay, so as memory bank serves, I became aware of New Year’s by age six or so. I remember climbing into my mom’s bed early one morning, snuggling into the fuzzy blankets only she used as she pulled me close and told me, “Happy New Year.”

That was a wake up call to Young Georgette. New Year? When did that happen? I just wanted to ask her for pancakes.

Mom went on to explain to a stunned me how she stayed up with my older sister to watch the year change, and this was an interesting phenomena. First, my mother and sister did something cool without telling me. Second, what did they see?

I suspected cute raccoons were there because I thought that all funs things happened that night.

“Fireworks,” my mom explained. “Just fireworks and we count to midnight for the year to change.”

My six-year-old brain associated midnight with Cinderella, so the fairy tale aspect combined with pyrotechnics simply added to my disappointment and jealousy. So I sat up in bed and ordered my mother to tell me more of this holiday I wasn’t aware of.

This means I started resolutions around the age of seven. That gives me at least 17 years of failed resolution making, meaning I’m three years away of making this a habit. This is a snowball-ed conclusion, but it’s how my mind works.

This year needs to be different, and I guess succeeding in my resolutions is resolution numero uno.

#1. KEEP YOUR RESOLUTIONS, YOU!

I hear ya, Past Georgette. I know you want me to succeed and actually stick to these plans, but I don’t even have a five-year plan, unless you count me planning to watch Mocking Jay Part 1 and Part 2 in the next two years. That’s as far as those plans go really.

But really, Past Georgette, Future Georgette will do her best to keep these resolutions in mind, and you know why?

Because I’m only going to make two resolutions, not including this one. Does this one count? I’m unsure.

TWO! and sort of a third one.

This puts me in a bind because now if I do not succeed at any of the following two, then I’ve shot myself about keeping this one.

Pretty neat trick, Current Georgette.

#2. WRITE

That sounds silly, considering that that’s what I’m trying to do and profess to love doing, but I want to push myself in 2014.

This year, I realized what type of writer I wanted to be and what I wanted to write—this too sounds slightly silly to admit, but it happens—so I want to focus on writing more often to develop better habits and to get my name out there. I contribute online for two sites but haven’t had many recent articles, so I’ll need to push myself to pitch more stories more often. I also want to work on my personal blog, and to build that up too.

Gotta concentrate like Brando and that cat.

I want to write humor and I want to do it online. I admittedly enjoy social media and talking with other people, so I want to be a part of a working blog (other than you, lovely Poor Writers). I already love reading certain ones, so I want to build my own clips along with building up my own voice.

#3. DO OPEN MICS

I am so reticent to even bring this up, and I have a strong inclination to go back and delete it—wait what are you doing pinky finger? You stop inching towards the Delete key!—but I want to do it.

Again at least.

One time more, if nerves don’t get to me.

For those of you who do not know, I tried stand-up recently, and along with this current pit-falling feeling in my stomach—Stomach, what are you doing? You just ate some cereal! Why are you not happy?—I nervously went on stage. Twice.

Right now, I’m trying to remember the successful high I had that second night when people laughed at the right spots and where I paid attention and paced myself, but I can’t. All I can feel is my stomach doing gymnastics.

I regret eating those two bowls of Capt’n Crunch right now.

But those are my goals. They’re pretty simple enough to remember, which is always good, and it also means I can remember them in a snappy way.

Cheers!

Let’s see how it goes, fellow poor writers.

And, of course, Happy New Year.