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dolorosa_12So, here we are at the close of yet another year. My country of origin is on literal and figurative fire, my chosen home country at the moment is on the figurative cliff edge, ready to dive off on 31 January, and generally the state of the world is not good. This is, therefore, yet another year of great personal and professional success for me, which took place against a backdrop of apocalyptic collapse.
So I guess it's time for the year's end meme?
1. What did you do in 2019 that you'd never done before?
Go to Worldcon — and indeed go to a convention at all, as Worldcon was my first convention. Talk about jumping in at the deep end!
It was also my first year of being published in peer-reviewed scientific journals (in my former life as a medievalist I had been published in humanities journals, but scientific ones are a whole different story); I had two publications this year, with two more currently undergoing edits, one article accepted but as yet unpublished, and two more ready to be sent out for submission.
2. Did you keep your new year's resolutions, and will you make more for next year?
My resolutions for 2019 were, as they have been for several years now, to carve out spaces of safety, kindness, empathy and beauty where I can, to draw my own personal lines in the sand, and hold to them, to support and live and love with integrity, and to remember, always, that love, love is a verb, love is a doing word.
To remain until the lights go out.
I'd like to think I did my best at this, although the latter is, as of 13th December this year, impossible.
I had some concrete professional goals relating to getting published, and receiving a teaching qualification, all of which were achieved. I also had a goal to log every book read, movie and TV show watched, concert or exhibition attended, and to write something, even if it was just a sentence, about each of these things online, either on Dreamwidth, on my Wordpress blog, or as a throwaway remark on Twitter. I also managed this.
My resolutions for 2020 are probably a mixture of the above. I want to stick to my 'fire can be a candle flame' resolution that I've made each new year since 2016, and will continue to do my best, no matter what my various countries throw at me. Again, I have a few concrete professional and personal goals, but I prefer to keep those private until the close of the next year.
3. Did anyone close to you give birth?
Quite a few of my friends had their first (and, in some cases, second) child this year, and it's been lovely to get to know all these wonderful new babies!
4. Did anyone close to you die?
Not this year, thankfully.
5. What countries did you visit?
I went to Sweden with Matthias to visitnaye and doctorskuld, Germany for the wedding of one of Matthias's cousins, and later for a joint birthday celebration for my two parents-in-law, onwards to Austria to visit our good friends V and P, who live there now (and I guess, technically, Belgium and France as we travelled through them on the train getting to and from Austria), and Ireland for Worldcon. I try to visit one new-to-me country every year, and fulfilled that with the Sweden trip.
6. What would you like to have in 2020 that you lacked in 2019?
To be honest, I think what I said last year kind of sums things up for this year as well:
One of the most confronting things about recent years is how much hope and good fortune I have for myself and the small things I can control, and how much despair I have for the wider world. My own immediate material circumstances have been improving sharply since 2015, and it's been horrifying to watch the reverse happen outside my own life.
What I want for 2020 is what I wanted for 2019: hope for the future. It's hard to have that when you have even a small amount of knowledge of world history, enough to see the world around you simultaneously repeating the 1930s in Europe and the dying days of Moorish Spain.
If anything, this year represented the point at which I utterly gave up on expecting any kind of hope to materialise. I no longer think it's realistic or possible.
7. What date from 2019 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
18th May, the date of the Australian federal election, whose result left me sobbing hysterically in Thetford railway station, and 12th December, the date of the British general election, whose exit poll was like a door closing.
8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
I'm quite proud of my professional achievements this year — I got promoted, as I said above, I got published in academic journals, I received a teaching qualification, and I presented at various conferences, with papers which were extremely well received. After two career changes, it is just so satisfying to finally be working in a field where I feel competent, confident, and appreciated by colleagues.
I also believe that the quiet work of everyday labour — cooking, cleaning, gardening, managing relationships both personal and professional, supporting people in their learning and research — is a kind of achievement in itself, and requires effort that is not often noticed or valued, so I think that I, and all who do this kind of work do an unequivocal good.
I think those kinds of humble, small, everyday achievements are what we need to focus on, because the glorious, big, loud ones require us to sacfifice more of ourselves than we are, for the most part, prepared to give.
9. What was your biggest failure?
This year really messed up my mental health, with knock-on effects to my physical health — I ground my teeth with stress with such force that I damaged a tooth and had to have it filled, I gave myself colds repeatedly due to lack of sleep, and so on. I did my best to manage my mental health, and got better at it in the second half of the year, so I wouldn't call this a failure exactly — and in any case, I challenge anyone to deal with the various horrors the world is currently throwing at us and not damage their mental health. It was a failure in the sense that it made things very difficult for me, but I don't view it as a profound personal fault.
10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
Mainly the above, plus lots of colds, headaches, and bruises from bumping into furniture.
11. What was the best thing you bought?
Definitely the flight/train tickets and hotel bookings for all the various travel undertaken this year! Travelling fills me with such joy, and I'm so privileged to live in such close proximity to so many other countries and be able to afford to visit them.
12. Whose behaviour merited celebration?
As with last year, I started 2019 with a plea for kindness, kindness, kindness, and, to be honest, everyone who practiced this in the face of an exploitative, selfish and ungentle world merits worldwide celebrations.
Matthias, for his love, belief and support, for making me a braver person. My mother, for her continued material and emotional support. Friends, near and far, online and off, for everything.
13. Whose behaviour made you appalled and depressed?
It's becoming a bit of a theme that last year's answers apply equally well this year, and this question is no different:
The obvious answer is the politicians of my country of origin, current country of residence, and all around the world. I'm also furious at their enablers: the voters who gave them power, the tabloid press who act as their cheer squad, and those, ostensibly on 'my side' for whom compromise is more poisonous than survival.
I have to also say that as a migrant who had to repeatedly apply for expensive and complicated visas, and who still has anxiety every time I have to deal with border guards, the fact that so many Britons were jubilant to throw away their free movement rights like garbage was incredibly upsetting and painful to witness.
14. Where did most of your money go?
Rent, bills, and travel expenses.
15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?
Travel. Worldcon. Books. Stories.
16. What song will always remind you of 2019?
Forever and ever The Tempest by Pendulum.
Too late to drop the drawbridge, you let the vampires in indeed.
17. Compared to this time last year, are you:
i. happier or sadder? Weirdly, less sad. I feel kind of blank and resigned to the state of the world, whereas last year I felt sad, but resolved to keep fighting.
ii. thinner or fatter? Probably about the same.
iii. richer or poorer? Due to my promotion at work, slightly richer.
18. What do you wish you'd done more of?
Yoga and gardening.
19. What do you wish you'd done less of?
Like last year, feeling furious and terrified every time I read my Twitter feed.
20. How did you spend Christmas?
My in-laws travelled to the UK to celebrate with us this year. On the evening of the 24th (which is the time for the main celebration in Germany) we distributed presents and had a cold seafood dinner (the meal of choice for Matthias's family on Christmas Eve). On the 25th I served a hot lunch to everyone and we just chilled out at our place.
22. Did you fall in love in 2019?
I stayed in love with Matthias, and clung to him in the ruins.
23. Did your heart break in 2019?
Twice. On 18th May, when the door slammed closed, and on 12th December, when the final bolt was locked in place.
24. What was your favourite TV program?
Years and Years would have been this, if not for its cloyingly sentimental ending which undercut everything that had gone before.
My favourites were probably Dublin Murders, and Derry Girls.
Giri/Haji also deserves mention here. Warrior was a stealth hit that seems to have slipped under the radar for most people.
25. Where were you when 2019 began?
Having a fancy meal in one of the gastropubs/gin bars in Cambridge.
26. Who were you with?
I was with Matthias.
27. Where will you be when 2019 ends?
At my friends' house in Ely.
28. Who will you be with when 2019 ends?
Withnotasapleasure, her husband, and my wonderful Matthias.
29. What was the best book you read?
I don't even need to think about this. There can be no answer but A Memory Called Empire, by Arkady Martine.
I also did my annual Twitter thread of favourite books read in the year, so you can have a look at that if you want a longer list of favourites.
30. What was your greatest musical discovery?
I owe this discovery to Matthias, but Rein. Utter perfection.
I also loved, loved, loved KEiiNO, Norway's Eurovision entry, for good cheesy fun. The Northern Lights are dancing, and so am I.
31. What did you want and get?
A promotion.
32. What did you want and not get?
To stop Brexit. For Australia to stop violating the human rights of refugees. For the world to do something about climate change.
33. What was your favourite film of this year?
I don't think this was the greatest year for films, but I did really enjoy Knives Out. I also saw Into the Spiderverse for the first time, and thought it was incredible.
34. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
Matthias took me out for a delicous meal at a new-to-me sushi restaurant. I was thirty-five.
35. How many different states/cities did you travel to in 2019?
Other than several day trips to Ely and London, I went all over the Yorkshire moors and coast with my mother when we hiked along the Cleveland Way, I was in Nottingham for a conference, and spent a couple of long weekends in Brighton and Manchester respectively. In Germany I was in Kesbern and Schonach (with a few hours in Rothenburg), in Austria I was in Vienna, and in Ireland I was in Dublin.
36. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2019?
Like last year, all the stars. All the nebulae. Or, as I prefer to describe it, #intergalacticnebulousbisexual. I also started to fulfill my ambtion of turning into both the physical embodiment of the EU flag, and a garden.
37. What kept you sane?
Swimming. About halfway through the year I began swimming a kilometre, three times a week, before starting work, and it really, really helped.
And, like last year: 'Rain is not always a storm. The wind does not always howl. Sometimes death is quiet or love is peaceful.' 'Fire can be a candle flame.'
38. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
I think I have to go back to my former answer: I am choosing to designate Pagan Kidrouk as a public figure.
39. What political issue stirred you the most?
Generally, the absolutely vile way migrants and refugees are treated in virtually the whole world. Climate change was obviously always there as a source of tension and grief as well.
40. How many concerts did you see in 2019?
Two — I was unbelievably fortunate to get the chance to experience my favourite band (Massive Attack) playing a twenty-year anniversary concert for my favourite album of all time (Mezzanine), although I found the idea better than the execution, due to the rather soulless choice of concert venue. The second concert, which I wrote about here, was more to my taste in terms of venue and mood.
41. Did you have a favourite concert in 2019?
I think I preferred the second one, while still feeling extremely privileged to have heard Robert Del Naja growl 'we can unwind all these half-flaws' at me in person.
42. Who was the best new person you met?
I really enjoyed meeting so many Dreamwidth and other online friends at Worldcon in person for the first time.
43. Did you do anything you are ashamed of this year?
No.
44. What was your most embarrassing moment of 2019?
I'm not easily embarrassed.
45. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2019.
It is not enough to reveal the truth — you have to make voters care that they are being lied to.
46. What are your plans for 2020?
To grow among the growing things.
47. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year:
Don't waste your breath
Don't waste your heart
Don't blister your heels
Running in the dark
I walked to the river
And I walked to the rim
I walked through the teeth of the reaper's grin
I walked to you rolled up in wire
To the other side of desire
But I have to also add that my year is summed up not only in lyrics, but in prose: Arkady Martine's devastating, powerful, hopeful, call to arms of an essay that gives this post its name, everyone's world is ending all the time. Everyone's world is ending all the time. Okay. So, what, then are we going to do about it? Let's get to work.
So I guess it's time for the year's end meme?
1. What did you do in 2019 that you'd never done before?
Go to Worldcon — and indeed go to a convention at all, as Worldcon was my first convention. Talk about jumping in at the deep end!
It was also my first year of being published in peer-reviewed scientific journals (in my former life as a medievalist I had been published in humanities journals, but scientific ones are a whole different story); I had two publications this year, with two more currently undergoing edits, one article accepted but as yet unpublished, and two more ready to be sent out for submission.
2. Did you keep your new year's resolutions, and will you make more for next year?
My resolutions for 2019 were, as they have been for several years now, to carve out spaces of safety, kindness, empathy and beauty where I can, to draw my own personal lines in the sand, and hold to them, to support and live and love with integrity, and to remember, always, that love, love is a verb, love is a doing word.
To remain until the lights go out.
I'd like to think I did my best at this, although the latter is, as of 13th December this year, impossible.
I had some concrete professional goals relating to getting published, and receiving a teaching qualification, all of which were achieved. I also had a goal to log every book read, movie and TV show watched, concert or exhibition attended, and to write something, even if it was just a sentence, about each of these things online, either on Dreamwidth, on my Wordpress blog, or as a throwaway remark on Twitter. I also managed this.
My resolutions for 2020 are probably a mixture of the above. I want to stick to my 'fire can be a candle flame' resolution that I've made each new year since 2016, and will continue to do my best, no matter what my various countries throw at me. Again, I have a few concrete professional and personal goals, but I prefer to keep those private until the close of the next year.
3. Did anyone close to you give birth?
Quite a few of my friends had their first (and, in some cases, second) child this year, and it's been lovely to get to know all these wonderful new babies!
4. Did anyone close to you die?
Not this year, thankfully.
5. What countries did you visit?
I went to Sweden with Matthias to visit
naye and doctorskuld, Germany for the wedding of one of Matthias's cousins, and later for a joint birthday celebration for my two parents-in-law, onwards to Austria to visit our good friends V and P, who live there now (and I guess, technically, Belgium and France as we travelled through them on the train getting to and from Austria), and Ireland for Worldcon. I try to visit one new-to-me country every year, and fulfilled that with the Sweden trip.6. What would you like to have in 2020 that you lacked in 2019?
To be honest, I think what I said last year kind of sums things up for this year as well:
One of the most confronting things about recent years is how much hope and good fortune I have for myself and the small things I can control, and how much despair I have for the wider world. My own immediate material circumstances have been improving sharply since 2015, and it's been horrifying to watch the reverse happen outside my own life.
What I want for 2020 is what I wanted for 2019: hope for the future. It's hard to have that when you have even a small amount of knowledge of world history, enough to see the world around you simultaneously repeating the 1930s in Europe and the dying days of Moorish Spain.
If anything, this year represented the point at which I utterly gave up on expecting any kind of hope to materialise. I no longer think it's realistic or possible.
7. What date from 2019 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
18th May, the date of the Australian federal election, whose result left me sobbing hysterically in Thetford railway station, and 12th December, the date of the British general election, whose exit poll was like a door closing.
8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
I'm quite proud of my professional achievements this year — I got promoted, as I said above, I got published in academic journals, I received a teaching qualification, and I presented at various conferences, with papers which were extremely well received. After two career changes, it is just so satisfying to finally be working in a field where I feel competent, confident, and appreciated by colleagues.
I also believe that the quiet work of everyday labour — cooking, cleaning, gardening, managing relationships both personal and professional, supporting people in their learning and research — is a kind of achievement in itself, and requires effort that is not often noticed or valued, so I think that I, and all who do this kind of work do an unequivocal good.
I think those kinds of humble, small, everyday achievements are what we need to focus on, because the glorious, big, loud ones require us to sacfifice more of ourselves than we are, for the most part, prepared to give.
9. What was your biggest failure?
This year really messed up my mental health, with knock-on effects to my physical health — I ground my teeth with stress with such force that I damaged a tooth and had to have it filled, I gave myself colds repeatedly due to lack of sleep, and so on. I did my best to manage my mental health, and got better at it in the second half of the year, so I wouldn't call this a failure exactly — and in any case, I challenge anyone to deal with the various horrors the world is currently throwing at us and not damage their mental health. It was a failure in the sense that it made things very difficult for me, but I don't view it as a profound personal fault.
10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
Mainly the above, plus lots of colds, headaches, and bruises from bumping into furniture.
11. What was the best thing you bought?
Definitely the flight/train tickets and hotel bookings for all the various travel undertaken this year! Travelling fills me with such joy, and I'm so privileged to live in such close proximity to so many other countries and be able to afford to visit them.
12. Whose behaviour merited celebration?
As with last year, I started 2019 with a plea for kindness, kindness, kindness, and, to be honest, everyone who practiced this in the face of an exploitative, selfish and ungentle world merits worldwide celebrations.
Matthias, for his love, belief and support, for making me a braver person. My mother, for her continued material and emotional support. Friends, near and far, online and off, for everything.
13. Whose behaviour made you appalled and depressed?
It's becoming a bit of a theme that last year's answers apply equally well this year, and this question is no different:
The obvious answer is the politicians of my country of origin, current country of residence, and all around the world. I'm also furious at their enablers: the voters who gave them power, the tabloid press who act as their cheer squad, and those, ostensibly on 'my side' for whom compromise is more poisonous than survival.
I have to also say that as a migrant who had to repeatedly apply for expensive and complicated visas, and who still has anxiety every time I have to deal with border guards, the fact that so many Britons were jubilant to throw away their free movement rights like garbage was incredibly upsetting and painful to witness.
14. Where did most of your money go?
Rent, bills, and travel expenses.
15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?
Travel. Worldcon. Books. Stories.
16. What song will always remind you of 2019?
Forever and ever The Tempest by Pendulum.
Too late to drop the drawbridge, you let the vampires in indeed.
17. Compared to this time last year, are you:
i. happier or sadder? Weirdly, less sad. I feel kind of blank and resigned to the state of the world, whereas last year I felt sad, but resolved to keep fighting.
ii. thinner or fatter? Probably about the same.
iii. richer or poorer? Due to my promotion at work, slightly richer.
18. What do you wish you'd done more of?
Yoga and gardening.
19. What do you wish you'd done less of?
Like last year, feeling furious and terrified every time I read my Twitter feed.
20. How did you spend Christmas?
My in-laws travelled to the UK to celebrate with us this year. On the evening of the 24th (which is the time for the main celebration in Germany) we distributed presents and had a cold seafood dinner (the meal of choice for Matthias's family on Christmas Eve). On the 25th I served a hot lunch to everyone and we just chilled out at our place.
22. Did you fall in love in 2019?
I stayed in love with Matthias, and clung to him in the ruins.
23. Did your heart break in 2019?
Twice. On 18th May, when the door slammed closed, and on 12th December, when the final bolt was locked in place.
24. What was your favourite TV program?
Years and Years would have been this, if not for its cloyingly sentimental ending which undercut everything that had gone before.
My favourites were probably Dublin Murders, and Derry Girls.
Giri/Haji also deserves mention here. Warrior was a stealth hit that seems to have slipped under the radar for most people.
25. Where were you when 2019 began?
Having a fancy meal in one of the gastropubs/gin bars in Cambridge.
26. Who were you with?
I was with Matthias.
27. Where will you be when 2019 ends?
At my friends' house in Ely.
28. Who will you be with when 2019 ends?
With
notasapleasure, her husband, and my wonderful Matthias.29. What was the best book you read?
I don't even need to think about this. There can be no answer but A Memory Called Empire, by Arkady Martine.
I also did my annual Twitter thread of favourite books read in the year, so you can have a look at that if you want a longer list of favourites.
30. What was your greatest musical discovery?
I owe this discovery to Matthias, but Rein. Utter perfection.
I also loved, loved, loved KEiiNO, Norway's Eurovision entry, for good cheesy fun. The Northern Lights are dancing, and so am I.
31. What did you want and get?
A promotion.
32. What did you want and not get?
To stop Brexit. For Australia to stop violating the human rights of refugees. For the world to do something about climate change.
33. What was your favourite film of this year?
I don't think this was the greatest year for films, but I did really enjoy Knives Out. I also saw Into the Spiderverse for the first time, and thought it was incredible.
34. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
Matthias took me out for a delicous meal at a new-to-me sushi restaurant. I was thirty-five.
35. How many different states/cities did you travel to in 2019?
Other than several day trips to Ely and London, I went all over the Yorkshire moors and coast with my mother when we hiked along the Cleveland Way, I was in Nottingham for a conference, and spent a couple of long weekends in Brighton and Manchester respectively. In Germany I was in Kesbern and Schonach (with a few hours in Rothenburg), in Austria I was in Vienna, and in Ireland I was in Dublin.
36. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2019?
Like last year, all the stars. All the nebulae. Or, as I prefer to describe it, #intergalacticnebulousbisexual. I also started to fulfill my ambtion of turning into both the physical embodiment of the EU flag, and a garden.
37. What kept you sane?
Swimming. About halfway through the year I began swimming a kilometre, three times a week, before starting work, and it really, really helped.
And, like last year: 'Rain is not always a storm. The wind does not always howl. Sometimes death is quiet or love is peaceful.' 'Fire can be a candle flame.'
38. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
I think I have to go back to my former answer: I am choosing to designate Pagan Kidrouk as a public figure.
39. What political issue stirred you the most?
Generally, the absolutely vile way migrants and refugees are treated in virtually the whole world. Climate change was obviously always there as a source of tension and grief as well.
40. How many concerts did you see in 2019?
Two — I was unbelievably fortunate to get the chance to experience my favourite band (Massive Attack) playing a twenty-year anniversary concert for my favourite album of all time (Mezzanine), although I found the idea better than the execution, due to the rather soulless choice of concert venue. The second concert, which I wrote about here, was more to my taste in terms of venue and mood.
41. Did you have a favourite concert in 2019?
I think I preferred the second one, while still feeling extremely privileged to have heard Robert Del Naja growl 'we can unwind all these half-flaws' at me in person.
42. Who was the best new person you met?
I really enjoyed meeting so many Dreamwidth and other online friends at Worldcon in person for the first time.
43. Did you do anything you are ashamed of this year?
No.
44. What was your most embarrassing moment of 2019?
I'm not easily embarrassed.
45. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2019.
It is not enough to reveal the truth — you have to make voters care that they are being lied to.
46. What are your plans for 2020?
To grow among the growing things.
47. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year:
Don't waste your breath
Don't waste your heart
Don't blister your heels
Running in the dark
I walked to the river
And I walked to the rim
I walked through the teeth of the reaper's grin
I walked to you rolled up in wire
To the other side of desire
But I have to also add that my year is summed up not only in lyrics, but in prose: Arkady Martine's devastating, powerful, hopeful, call to arms of an essay that gives this post its name, everyone's world is ending all the time. Everyone's world is ending all the time. Okay. So, what, then are we going to do about it? Let's get to work.