Adieu to 2012–The year of w(h)ining, dining & dashing (and maybe a baby)

Somehow Christmas has come and gone in a blur. And the haziness wasn’t due to wine or rum (not this year anyway), but rather the flurry of activity that comes from thinking and planning and then neglecting to start actually doing anything, including decorating the house, until December 22.

I am suffering a massive food hangover. The blood in my veins has been replaced by caffeine and bubbly and I’ve gotten into a bad habit of thinking gingerbread men are a perfectly balanced breakfast (there’s protein in the eggs, right?). No wonder people vow to eat salads for all of January under the label of “resolution.” I prefer to call it penance for a month of committing the most offensive of nutrition sins.

I used to be a believer in resolutions until I realized it’s actually the French word for “failure” (very loosely defined). However I always like to reflect on the past year so I can think about longer-term plans for the upcoming one (plans that don’t fizzle by January 9). In order to properly focus on 2013, it’s important I look back at the highlights of 2012. So here goes:

– 5k race completed at 37 weeks pregnant.

– April 9 – Tore every shelf out my refrigerator including one I didn’t know could be removed, and scrubbed it top to bottom. Also, had a baby the next morning.

– Discovered that severe sleep deprivation made me forget which lever in my vehicle controls the turn signal. Don’t worry, I got it right the third try.

– My first post-birth run, a short 3k six weeks after giving birth. Cursed myself, my husband for his role in my becoming pregnant in the first place, my doctor for giving me the green light to run again, Adidas for supporting my feet, but not having the foresight to develop cushioning for my girly bits, and whoever thought of expanding running into a pleasurable and sometimes competitive endeavour rather than simply a necessary tool for hunting food. I think I can hold the Greeks partially responsible even though the Olympic Games probably seemed like a good idea at the time.

– June 23 – My first 10k race since before having Little Dude. My misplaced anger was replaced by mild annoyance that there wasn’t a postpartum category for racers that yielded a get-of-jail-free-card, or at the very least, a chauffeured golf cart to the top of the deathly hill around the 7k mark.

– Nailed the perfect stretch of time between nursing, having a glass of wine and nursing again.

– July 10 – An editor from iRun contacted me to let me know I was a top 10 finalist for Blog Idol 2.0. They were kind enough to announce it exactly 10 days before my birthday (I’m just narcissistic enough to believe it to be true), providing a worthy distraction from my annual mental breakdown over no longer being in my 20s.

– September 29 – Half-marathon completed with the assistance of family, friends and obscene levels of caffeine.

– U.S. election. This wasn’t really a personal accomplishment per se, but worth noting for the entertaining drinking game Mr. S and I came up with based on every Republican reference to family planning and every Obama reference to his role in Bin Laden’s death.

– November – Vegas. If I couldn’t eat it, drink it, gamble it or run it, it wasn’t on the agenda.

Looking back makes me equal parts excited and terrified of what the new year may hold. If the past 12 months is any indication it will hopefully include new (and old) friends, milestones, first steps, new races and challenges, and maybe a new bottle of sparkling rosé.