I try to write about the mundane now. The moments in between. Those that, when strung together, create the most beautiful memories I can look back on and smile.

There’s this movement going on around about this practice called “Word of the Year” whereby you pick one word — just one — to focus on instead of going for numerous New Year’s resolutions that you formulate at the start of the year and break halfway before the next countdown.

Gratitude.

That’s the word I picked. The one thing I try to ground myself in no matter how shitty things can get. Because it’s too easy to let it hit the fan. The challenge is to grow against entropy with all the energy you got. For me, that means showing up at my desk every day at 5:30 in the morning to journal my thoughts away. Or at the very least, try. Because some days, I just really wanna sleep. And I think that’s okay, too. This isn’t the military.

It helps to have a partner who supports my madness. When I get up to light my candles in my corner spot, my heart rests in the thought that he accepts my weirdness. I’ll be there burning bay leaves and sipping bone broth and he would think nothing of it.

Just another day being married to a weirdo.

I once had a very meaningful conversation with a deaf patient about marriage. I can’t sign but she could lip read. With my mask down, I asked her what the secret was to her 48 years of marriage.

“Be yourself,” she said. That was it.

And to be honest with you, her answer totally caught me off guard. I sure as hell wasn’t expecting that but there it was, so simple and yet so profound. Of all the “secrets to a happy marriage” offered to me by my patients, that’s the one I find remarkable.

Jeff never buys me flowers but last month he bought me a bouquet of markers which is pretty much the same thing. He knows I do art journaling and thought I would appreciate a different medium aside from the watercolor and gouache I’m used to.

I did have a go with them but to be honest, I find markers unforgiving. I love the boldness of the colors but at the same time, I feel like you need to have an agenda on how to go about your work. You can’t just wing it and hope for the best. It’s a technique I have yet to learn.

Raven, on the other hand, seemed to have mastered it straight away with no problem at all so, I don’t know. Maybe it’s just me.

On a side note, the lotus magnolia tree at the front has bloomed already! It’s such a glorious sight. Pity how they blossom in late winter to early spring where the strong winds can just as easily blow their delicate petals away.

But look at how pretty the flowers in my wild garden are. Yesterday found me snipping some of the blossoms in the cold wet rain just so I can display their beauty in a glass jar.

I call them the muted colors of the promise of spring.

Also known as I can’t wait for this fucking cold to be over.