There was good as well as bad, but the bad took so much energy, took so much from me, that I don't know if I have it in me to write out a big manifesto, but here it comes anyway.
I can sum up the year with these thoughts:
- Never before 2007 have I had a year with so much financial prosperity yet with so much uncertainty hanging in the balance threatening to ruin me at any moment and without warning.
- Never before 2007 have I had so much potential manifesting in various projects yet with so much uncertainty threatening to cancel funding, delay progress, or halt production.
- Never before 2007 have I felt such a complete and all-encompassing love for someone with so much uncertainty threatening to tear my heart out no matter what I did. And in the end it did, in the most cruel of ways. Note to the kids: never fall in love with someone who is bipolar unless they're already getting the help that they admittedly know they need, no matter how well you thought you knew them or know them now. No matter what you do, no matter how hard you try, no matter how much you want it, no matter what you say, or how you say it, the other person (bipolar or not) is always going to do what *they* are going to do... /rant
Fortunately, some of this uncertainty panned out in my favor. I'm a pragmatist, a realist, not a pessimist after all, and I was able to take the successes and turn them into powerful resources that will continue to help prepare me for what's to come. Because while so many other things broke my heart, or stole my credit, or misrepresented me, my interests and/or intentions, or were simply the result of someone else showing that they didn't have the guts to look at their self in the mirror (or me in the face to talk it through), the pot of gold was at the end of the rainbow just as it was foretold: my deal working for IBM after they acquired FileNet (because we kept handing their asses to them in the marketplace with our better product offerings) ended as it was supposed to. Not early or later than expected, and not without the severance package they promised when the deal was agreed to. That left me pretty (OK, *very*) flush for the final quarter of 2007, which allowed me to have a degree of comfort and safety that I'd never known before, and which helped a great deal with seeing that life will in fact go on, and that I can in fact make it though anything, just as I have so many times before.
So I took this bounty, and I spent the last quarter of 2007 building new armor, sharpening my blades, pressing new shells for the big guns, fine-tuning my sensors, recalibrating my targeting reticule, and drawing brand new lines in the sand. In 2008 I'm going to be ready for the fight like never before. Because when it's all said and done, this fight is on familiar territory. Nothing new going on, I just wasn't ready for the sucker punches thrown at me by the weaklings in my life, which was a flaw I admittedly had created for myself. But a flaw that has now been corrected. Cuz hey, if you're a real warrior of any status or caliber, you can never stop training. And you have to be ready for *anything*, not just the enemy in your forward sights. For 2008, I'm not making any declarations of resolutions. I'm instead going to continue to follow through on the work already in progress...
And in 2008, I may burn yet more bridges. But every one that's been burned had someone on the other side who did nothing to prevent it. They did what *they* were going to do, or they hid their true intentions/selves, or they hid altogether instead of facing the challenge head on. And if I didn't like it, they made it clear by their actions/in-actions that it wasn't going to be *their* problem. And so, I no longer give a rat's ass what they think. Introducing the 2008 model "The Fin": kicking ass, but not bothering to take any names. Just leaving it in the past. Always forward, never straight.
But let me be clear about this part: I'm not heartless, and I can and do forgive even the greatest of betrayals when it can be seen that it's worth the effort to try. A couple of those bridges, for one the wreckage of which had lay cold and dead for many many years, is now in the process of being built anew, based on a new understanding, a new set of rules, a new relationship with different goals in mind. Because true love never dies, it just sometimes has to take on another, stronger form. And there's some great things going on lately that will gel in early 2008 that show that the way forward has love and trust and prosperity and other fluffy fuzzy stuff that suggests that I may be doing something right. And still other bridges were never actually burned, the road too important, the destination too valuable. Those bridges will just have to lay unused for the time being, until the time is right to once again make contact with the other side.
And yes, with this kind of a hardware/wetware upgrade, I know I have to do a Saving Throw vs. Inhumanity, because if I do this wrong, I'm just going to end up being an ass and pissing everybody off. But I get sweet dice modifiers for high natural numbers in my Empathy, Spirituality, Awareness and Determination attributes, and I've got Contacts and Fixers you can talk to who will swear that I'm a good guy with a heart of gold. Things have just been tough, ya know? And now it's time to bounce back full force. But on *my* terms...
So hello 2008, whatcha got?
