James Proclaims!

According to my understanding of the Gregorian calendar, today is the last day of the year that I have mainly been referring to as ‘2023’. And if that is the case, then I must abide by my own rules and produce some kind of a review of the year. Because I do it every year. Or I have done it every year since 2015, which is, in truth, not every year at all. Just the years I have been an active blogger.

Whether I deserve to refer to myself as an ‘active blogger’, when I have spent very little of 2023 maintaining this blog is possibly debateable. A quick look back at what I wrote for the 2022 equivalent of this ‘end of year’ effort, would suggest I didn’t do much blogging in 2022 either. I did, as I recall, write a fair bit in the preceding two years, but I think that was mainly as a reaction to a certain pandemic. I’d like to get back to being a proper blogger and updating these little-read pages with my unsolicited observations of the world, but I’m not in a hurry to see another contagious disease sweeping the world, so I’m going to have to find a different kind of motivation in 2024.

That sounds like something I might want to address in my obligatory New Year’s Resolution post and consequently a problem I can defer until tomorrow. Which is the best way to deal with all problems in my experience.

It is, nonetheless, quite hard for me to review 2023, because I’m not sure I really took part in it. I wasn’t just avoiding blogging for most of the past year, I was avoiding any kind of meaningful existence.

That is because my life is now entirely devoted to my two daughters. I’m not sure this is because I’m an especially good parent and more because I’m not really sure how not to devote my entire existence to them. Small children, as it turns out, are quite demanding.

What little I have seen of the news in 2023, suggests that world events have not, on the whole, been especially positive. Perhaps my frequent trips to the play park and/or soft play have been as good as anything anyone else has been up to.

I went on holiday in August. It was a UK-based holiday but I did spend a week in a static caravan somewhere that I don’t live. The children were with me for all of that week though so it was really not that different to not being on holiday. Except I was in a caravan rather than a house. Which isn’t necessarily an improvement. I think I enjoyed the holiday though. I’m certain my children did anyway, which is apparently all that counts.

I’m not sure I’ve evolved all that much as a person in 2023. Possibly I have though. A new Indiana Jones film came out and I haven’t seen it yet. It’s available to stream on a service I subscribe to, I’m a massive fan of Indiana Jones and I haven’t seen it. But I have seen the latest Paw Patrol movie. Twice.

I’ve also started listening to audiobooks. Quite obsessively. I used to read books obsessively once upon a time, but that is something that necessitates ‘finding time to do stuff’ and having two kids means that I’m more likely to find miscellaneous plastic toys in my shoes than ‘time to do stuff’. But audiobooks can be consumed while doing other stuff, like driving, or wandering around the supermarket or picking up miscellaneous plastic toys, so I’m very much a fan of the medium.

My daughters both have evolved. This is to be expected. They are children. Most experiences are new and exciting to small children. Little Proclaims is now in her second year of compulsory education and seems to be fairly enthusiastic about this. She is fairly enthusiastic about a lot things a lot of the time and school, for the most part, seems to suit her. She can now read and write a bit. She is more motivated by the former than the latter and regularly reads even the most mundane of billboards aloud as we navigate through the various commutes life throws our way. Mini Proclaims is still attempting to master speech but has started to develop a few key words to communicate her wants and needs. Her favourite word is ‘chocolate’.

Mrs Proclaims continues to work on a PhD that has seemingly taken up most of her adult life. If all goes well, I might be able to report the successful end of that endeavour this time next year. But she won’t thank me for attempting to count metaphorical chickens on that subject. I’m not sure what she’ll do with herself when she has completed her studies though. Maybe she can start a blog.

In summary then, 2023 was a year in which I was mainly a dad. I like being a dad, but I have no idea what else happened in 2023.

I expect something did though. Maybe other people have written about it.

But I’m not remotely qualified to offer any insight.

Other than to say that 2023 was definitely a year that did happen and in that sense, it achieved its main purpose.

If you are planning to stay up and see the New Year in, then raise a glass for me. I’m pretty sure I’ll have passed out on the sofa several hours beforehand. And I won’t have touched a drop of alcohol.