Swedish Lapland
I’m not one for New Year’s Resolutions, but I do like the feeling of new beginnings and fresh opportunities and this year feels like such a big one for me.
After laying all the groundwork for my new business venture over the past 12 months, this is the year we are going to make it happen. We are on the verge of the ‘next big steps’ and while it is nerve-wracking, we are determined to succeed.
I have two major assignments due for my doctorate, which are a critical stage in defining my proposal and getting the ethical go ahead. Once they are both done, my research and work can start in earnest.
And of course my other more physical challenges. In just a few weeks I have a 5-day 250km race in the Swedish arctic circle. Typically I am feeling very under-trained after a month of (at times quite severe) back pain, but as the pain has lessened I’ve been able to build my training back up. Buying kit has been a major and hugely expensive undertaking and I think I’m going to need to plan a return trip somewhere extremely cold to ensure I make the most of it. There’s an event I have seen in February 2021 so money permitting - I will keep my eye on that. Having repeatedly asked me ‘You aren’t thinking of doing Everest are you?’ over the past months, my family would have been appalled to know that I was obsessively watching documentaries about K2 and Everest last night and this morning. But I’m not looking to climb that as I can’t think of any way to pay for it - not sure that will put their minds at ease, but for the meantime, Everest base-camp is the highest point on my bucket list.
My plans for later this year are slowly building. Little things are getting done - like converting my garage into a make-shift gym so I can prepare myself physically, searching routes and possible sponsorship and working out how and where I can still manage to work en route.
I saw in the New Year in typical mode … fast asleep. Then I woke up 15 minutes past midnight and barked Happy New Year at my husband and fell back asleep. For many years I have hated New Year, as it seemed a painful reminder that another year was starting without loved ones who had died. Both Guy and I have lost all our parents over the past two decades so the pain isn’t there in the same way and I have been able to look to the coming year without the same sense of loss. Not that we don’t miss each of them, but time helps us move on.
So what do I want out of the coming year? To continue to make progress with my new business, to reach the end of year two of my (part-time) doctorate, to stop feeling ground down by the political state of the world, to make my own personal contribution to fighting climate change. These are not resolutions, just steps I want to continue to take to live life to the full.
Keep zooming.