I’ve spent most of the last week doing two things: playing The Binding of Isaac Afterbirth and typing up best of lists for January. Today, the last day of the year, I’m here at my desk, thinking about the year as a whole, and it really wasn’t terrible. Yeah it wasn’t great, or even quite as good as 2023. But maybe that’s the wrong way to examine each exiting year.
Let me go back to the basics to assess the year. Did we have enough to eat? Yes, always. Did our animals ever go hungry, or suffer from a lack of medical care? No. Was I not entertained? Oh, for sure. So what then, caused the feeling that 2024 sucked?
America was a large part of it. More specifically, watching half a year campaigned away, being assured over and over that surely no one would elect that guy again, and always thinking, Yeah, but y’all said that last time, and he got elected in the first place. And then he got elected again.
I’m here in Italy, where our voters decided that an actual fascist was fine. On the local level, my city decided to go strong to the left, which was something of a relief, but that’s one city in a country, you know? It’s a drop in the bucket.
On the global scale, I look around and see voters decide that less service and worse services are fine, so long as the rich don’t have to pay taxes. I wonder how it is that this bold-faced lie is believed so completely despite very recent history proving that so-called conservative rule doesn’t conserve anything aside from off-shore accounts. National budgets rise, deficits explode, civil servants get fucked over by their bosses AND the people they serve. And for what? Because everyone everywhere is convinced that the little guys need to prop up the aristocracy?
That’s the backdrop for my ennui, a handful of billionaires, all racing to become the first trillionaires, and all of their shit pouring metaphorically down into my life to dilute the happiness I have.
We’ve not received a raise to counter the rising food prices and energy bills. Every month there’s some unexpected expense that neatly zeroes out our bank balance, leaving us unable to build any savings. Every last two weeks, there’s the husband asking me again to be careful at the store, because we don’t have much left. It eats away at the joy I’m trying to hold onto, the constant gnawing that at some point, not even being careful will balance out to zero, leaving us with less than zero.
What I’m saying is, it’s fear and anger that have tainted everything good in 2024 to make it seem downright awful. But it wasn’t. Unlike a few prior years, I haven’t had to spend most of my time riding buses and trains to hospitals to visit my husband. He doesn’t have to commute two hours to go to work. He just gets out of bed and walks to the office. I ride my bike almost every day, weather permitting, and when my ankle will allow it, I’ve gone on long walks with my dogs and the cat.
Where I live, on a clear day, I can see a range of mountains stretching from the west all the way to the northeast. Even on a cloudy day, I can find beauty in the fields and crops all around me. I ought to be every bit as inspired as when I first moved to Milan and had a gorgeous view of the Alps right outside my window.
It’s all in the perspective, and I realize now that what tainted 2024 wasn’t really anything awful happening to me or mine. It was proxy threats. It was social dread, the daily anxiety of others that kept me looking away from my own life.
Which is why for 2025, in order to finish at least one new novel and two new short story collections, I will be giving the new year a slogan in Polish: Nie mój cyrk, nie moje małpy.
Not my circus, not my monkeys.
Which is terrible, I know, but more than ever, I’ve got to get back to making words I can sell. I can still remember the first years I put out several new books, and the result was, I could buy new furniture, a new TV, new books and games. I could afford to donate to charities and help people out in their times of need. That first flood of sold words got me my side gig editing for a web site and occasionally for their print magazine. I need to get back to that, to cover what we’re losing over time, and to eventually replace the stuff I bought that is now becoming obsolete.
2025 is my race to win, if I stick to my lane and just keep doing what I do. Butt in seat, words on screen. Everything else that might distract from that is only going to hurt me and stop me from writing and selling words. So: Nie mój cyrk, nie moje małpy.
I think all of us to a certain degree are going to have to embrace this to keep perspective on our own little pools of happiness. I’m not saying we can’t be part of communities and try to find our own people to bond with. That’s important too. But to keep moving ahead, we all need to see what’s in front of us and ask the basic stuff first. Do we have enough to eat? Are the bills paid? Are the animals and/or kids okay?
If all of those are a yes, then what’s really dragging us down isn’t what’s wrong in our homes. It’s the trickle down bullshit of society trying to convince us life is awful and meaningless, and anyway, AI is going to replace us all next week. So fuck it, give in to melancholy and despair. Don’t celebrate your everyday victories. Don’t find joy in your hobbies and pathways of mental escape.
No. Fuck that shit. Nie mój cyrk, nie moje małpy. Print it on a shirt. Learn to pronounce it right. Teach it to everyone who looks like they’re ready to accept defeat in 2025. Instead of deciding we’ve no fucks left to give, let’s all find the inner strength to push back and take our joy away from the jaws of ennui.
Not my circus, 2025, and not my monkeys.