inulro | A "Year That Was" Thingy

Normally, I loathe New Year's Eve. It can be summed up with a quote I stole from an unknown source: "That's another year shot to hell".

This year's sort of different. No, I haven't written anything, much less got published (the verbal centres of my brain are still utterly fried), nor have I visited Macchu Picchu or anything else a normal human being might consider achievement. No, my illness isn't any better - if anything, it's worse.

But I've finally regained some control over my life and finances this year, thanks to finally selling the Unwanted Real Estate.

At the start of this year, I was still being screwed around by lawyers, estate agents and my buyer. The sale almost fell through at the last minute, at which point I locked myself in the house and Failed to Cope for three days. The sale went through in the end. What would have happened if it hadn't does not bear thinking about.

But anyway it did, and I amalgamated all my negative equity and other debt (all indirectly brought about by the Unwanted Real Estate) into one loan with very hefty payments. Now, "hey folks, I'm deeply in debt", doesn't sound like an accomplishment, but the fact is I'm now well on the way to being debt-free, instead of digging myself deeper every month. I've even managed to put more than 25p into my savings account.

I also got a half decent pay rise in July and for the first time ever, I have enough money to pay rent & bills, eat, and buy stuff. Money may not buy happiness, but it sure as hell can deliver peace of mind. During the storms in November it became obvious I required a sensible winter coat - instead of agnonizing over it, trawling the charity shops and waiting for the sales, I was able to walk into a shop and buy a coat that fit my needs, problem solved in half an hour.

I've managed to change my job so that I do only the stuff I'm interested in and have an assistant to do the rest. I still hate my job a lot of the time, but occasionally I have feelings of accomplishment. Being paid a living wage helps the way I feel about it a lot. It probably shouldn't, but seeing as I don't even pretend to be here for any reason other than the money, it does.

I've been waiting for management to point out that I don't actually make it to work anything like full time (for over 6 months I didn't put in a whole week at any point), but they haven't. I had a brief attack of morality and nearly offered to reduce my hours, but I seem to be getting everything done in the time I'm here and until my loan is paid off I can't afford it.

I have achieved one of my longstanding goals this year; namely volunteering at the animal shelter. It's a lot of fun, and I hope to be able to carry on for another year.

For the first time in many years I feel like I have something to look forward to: technically it should be another 18 months before the loan is paid off, but I hope to do so this year. I'm planning to do a long weekend in Lisbon in March and the Cathars tour of the Pyrenees in the spring, so if I over-spend on travel I might not pay off the loan this year. Either way, having choices is very liberating.

I've stopped watching so much TV and I'm reading more. Not as much as I'd like, but as much as I can. I still have dozens of books I haven't read and Waterstones vouchers in my bag. But I wouldn't be me without that.

Health-wise, I'd like to get better, but I don't hold out a lot of hope. If I thought for a minute that resting for 6 months was guaranteed to make me better, I'd go for it. But there isn't any guarantee, so I'll continue to do as much as I physically can. I'd like to get less flabby, but every time I start even a basic exercise regime I get a lot more disabled and miss a lot more work (and everything else).

I'd love to have a social life, but my life is contracting every year. I'm kind of coming to terms with this, but OTOH I'm kind of angry about being able to come to terms with being a stay-at-home type person. Which, by nature, I am just not. But on the plus side, I have a nice home and a nice home life to make up for it. If you're any of the dozens of people I've lost touch with - I do think about you and mean to write a letter or email every day. But I'm a total slug and there's really no excuse.

I'd love to be able to make new year's resolutions, but the last several years have shown that I will be physically unable to achieve any of them, so I'll have to stick with doing as much as I can. I have no illusions about getting a new job or starting to drive again (the lack of independence that not being able to drive has brought about *really* annoys me).

And that, folks, is finally it.