I'm such a waste of a day off

I'm in the space in my apartment between the kitchen and the living room. It's not a dining room exactly, but it's where the kitchen table lives, so you can call it that if you want.

The dryer is humming obnoxiously. No, not humming. It's more like a growl. An angry, taunting grumble. "It's almost 10pm and you haven't finished your laundry yet," it lavishes.

My dryer is mean--it finds pleasure in mocking my misery. Sometimes it breaks just to spite me. "You can hang dry that load of laundry if you want," it laughs, "but your clothes will never dry in this humidity! Never."

My hair is styled in a top-of-the-head bun that I have pulled on all day, resulting in stringy pieces feathering down my neck and getting in my eyes. The hairstyle of a girl who is supposed to be cleaning, but can't pull away from Downton Abbey or my 2014 calendar project.

My sister gave me a personalized calendar last year, and two or three days ago I realized when I flipped the month there would be nothing there.

I'm not sure if my concern (read: anxiety, panic, downward spiral of emotional feels with which I cannot cope) comes from the end of the year, or the end of the calendar. But I spent all day putting together a new personalized calendar, and I could not rest until I hit submit on the Walgreens order form.

Thank you Walgreens for letting me spend $30 to do all the work of calendar creating. Well played.

I didn't want to start the new year without a new calendar.

Something ought to be in order when 2014 rolls around.

Because my life--wonderful, unexpected, magical to the 10th degree--is not in order.

The laundry is unfinished, my bags are half-packed from a trip I've had plenty of time to unbox, and speaking of boxes, I have empty ones lying around my room just in case. My current foster dog likes to decorate the living room with fake snow, made by murdering her toys and carrying their stuffing across the carpet. And I'm pretty sure the black stuff in my bathroom is mold I'm supposed to report to the apartment complex. Don't worry, I have a solution for that. It's name is bleach, and there's a giant container of it sitting on top of the angry dryer.

What I don't have a solution for, is the itchy feeling in my toes and sinking sentiment in my stomach telling me it's time to go.

Get out.

Run away.

Pack up those empty, just-in-case boxes and drive to where the sidewalk ends.

Or where the sidewalk starts.

Or somewhere.

"Go somewhere," it says.

But it never tells me where.

"I love it here," I try to reason.

But itchy toes and sinking stomachs won't be reasoned with.

All this gypsy soul stuff might just be the fear of the new year. Maybe I'll stay here forever. Maybe once January 1 rolls around my anxiety will dissipate and I'll delete this post, embarrassed that I ever thought I was going to leave this place that has become home.

But the empty boxes, whose scribbled writing looks like question marks from where I'm sitting, make me  simultaneously impatient and sad.

Impatient for something new and unfamiliar.

Sad at even the thought of leaving people, places, things I love.

But you know what, I'm just so grateful to have something worth being sad about.

I'm good at apathy. The avoidance of unnecessary emotions is something I've practiced since fifth grade when I cried because I forgot to get my reading log signed. I've been careful to avoid risks and hurt and guilt and all those negative emotions people say you can rule out if you learn from the mistakes of others.

I'm still trying to avoid mistakes.

But I'm considering being slightly less misanthropic to the risks.

Just slightly.

Because the risk it takes to love--someone, something, some place--is worth even gut-wrenching sadness.

And I don't wish gut-wrenching sadness on anyone. Especially myself. Like I said, my sadness coping capabilities are majorly below par.

But I can't pretend anymore that even horrible sadness isn't worth loving like crazy.

I was writing quotes from children's books on my calendar because I'm immature like that. And when I was searching I found one from the surprisingly insightful Winnie the Pooh. It says, "How lucky I am to have something that makes saying goodbye so hard."

I know this sounds something like a goodbye letter. But that's not what it is.

It's a hopeful note to the new year.

This last year was a good one--one that I'm terrified to close the calendar on. But since you'll be here in two days, with or without my permission, I'll give you a chance too, 2014. I have high expectations for you. After all, I've just decided to embrace love, even with the risk of sadness and possible disappointment.

Even if the winds are changing, I'm counting on something wonderful.

I don't know what's in store for tomorrow. Or over-morrow, or the day after that.

But I've got a sturdy pair of running shoes, some empty boxes just in case, and a dryer I wouldn't mind walking out on.

And I've got a lot of things that would make saying goodbye really hard.

I guess that makes me--the girl  sitting in the space between my kitchen and my living room with falling out hair and too many dreams to cope with--one of the lucky ones.