Resolutions, Reflections and Requiem

I woke up this morning a bit like a kid on Christmas Day.  

I had worked like a navvy yesterday to try and clean up my desk so that I could be prepared for the Genealogy Do Over.  

 I have literally put all my old research behind me.  

Look!

See!  There are all my old lever arch files.  I won't show you all the crap that is now lying in the hallway waiting to be chucked.  

Honestly - I am in heaven.  

This was my mother's desk.  And I've had that bookcase on top of it for the past 20 years. It worked well but I do love having all the desk space to work on rather than only half of it.

The way it is positioned now, I can talk to Robert in the kitchen face-on, if I need to....and if he can hear me, over the sizzling saucepans....see?  And I can also see people straight away when they come to the front door.  Yay!  

I can also see all the photo albums that need to be sorted...oh well... you can't have everything.

I decided that I'm only going to have genealogy and local history books in my nook from now on....wow!  Who knew I had so many?  It's been a great exercise sorting out all my magazines/journals and all my books....I'm a bit embarrassed how many I have....

Do you see any titles you recognize?  

So - I'm pretty chuffed.  Re-energized.  All that sort of stuff.

I even set up a Control Journal for goodness sake.  That took me all day but made me very aware of how easily I get distracted by the next shiny object.....hmmmm.

I looked at my New Year's Resolutions from last year.

Of course, I was completely over-ambitious and probably completed only 6 out of 12 of my resolutions.  

I did study and attend workshops regularly.

I kept scanning family photos and finding out as much as I could about them.

I corrected and tagged Trove articles where possible.

I created a Graves page on my blog and a bit more too!

I presented a talk to the family history group at the library where I work.

I participated in a genchat.

In my blogging I reported on genea-adventures, Trove discoveries, continued to contribute to Sepia Saturday and The Book of Me.

So for 2015 I hope to do all that AND.....

Review magazines/books on my blog.

Go on more genea-adventures.

Publish a journal article or equivalent.

Participate properly in a Google Hangout.

Listen to Genies Down Under podcasts.

Catch up on Gene TV shows.

Report on study I have undertaken.  

This afternoon I went a bit mad at Officeworks and bought, amongst other things,  a Dymo labeller - I feel like a proper grown-up now with a label maker (they're probably soooo last millenium now).  

And yes, one of those drawer organiser thingys.

i also bought an Olympus Digital Voice Recorder to record some Oral History interviews.  I'll let you know how that goes.

Oh and did I mention that my daughter said she would give me a DNA test for Xmas?  So I ordered that a couple of nights ago too.  

Wow!  I'm really excited about 2015 already.

Having said all that, I need for you to know that I went to a funeral on Friday.  

It was for a friend with whom I had lost contact over the years.  

She was only a couple of years older than me.  

It was a beautiful ceremony and lovely to see so many "old" friends.  

But heart-wrenching to witness their grief.  

One of the memorial items given out at the church was a bookmark. 

It had a very salutary quote on it from Neil Gaiman....

"You get what anybody gets - you get a lifetime."

Indeed.

A reminder to all of us to get our skates on.

My happiest memories of my time with Megan were our jazz ballet efforts to the tunes of Michael Jackson in the early 80s - followed swiftly by collapsing in front of the telly and laughing at Joan Collins' antics on Dynasty.  Sad but true.  

Lots of giggles.







Dancing is the loftiest, the most moving, the most beautiful of the arts, because it is no mere translation or abstraction from life; it is life itself.
                                                                                       Havelock Ellis

Vale Megan Orchard.