January

I got a new idea. Instead of kicking off the new year on January 1st, I’m going to take the whole month of January to set the stage for 2024.

My holidays were out of sync with the calendar this year. We really celebrated Christmas December 14-18, when we went to Quebec City with my siblings and nieces. Then we came home and Sam had a mini-health crisis. Then came the calendar Christmas which was very much a low-energy occasion. Then came the odd week between Christmas and New Year’s, which passed somehow. A visit to my sister in Southern Maine and preparing a letter to a childhood friend – getting back in touch after almost 60 years – these took up some time. Then came Jan 2-4, which involved new doctor’s appointments for Sam and the resolution of the mini-health crisis. And an unexpected visit from a family member who stayed two nights with us also happened.

I did little to no reflection on the new year. Not that I usually do, but even less than usual I think. Just moving through a day at a time.

So here we are on January 5. I cleaned my room thoroughly. Vacuumed everything. Vacuumed the top of the rug, turned the rug over, vacuumed the bottom of the rug, turned the rug back over only to find a lot of sand and dirt from the rug now lay on the floor. Vacuumed again. Lots of vacuuming. And a little rearranging of furniture. And plants. A neighbor brought us a potful of parsley plants, which are really nice to have inside.

So there will be more cleaning and rearranging and reorganizing and maybe some reflection and vowing for 2024 to come in the next few days or weeks.

Last year, I kept a sketch journal for 2023 and I completed it. I want to post some photos of certain pages, but I really don’t know what to make of it as a project. I’d like to make a list of what I found out through that process. I’d like to do something like that in 2024, but I don’t know what that would look like. Different from 2023.

Phase Transition

I looked this up because we were trying to recall the word “sublimation” – moving from a solid directly to a gas. It seemed to be happening when frost flowers disappeared from the windshield without any evidence of turning to droplets. I find this collection of words interesting and maybe useful someday.

• Gas to solid phase transitions are known as “deposition.”
• Gas to liquid phase transitions are known as “condensation.”
• Liquid to gas phase transitions are known as “vaporization.”
• Liquid to solid phase transitions are known as “freezing.”
• Solid to liquid phase transitions are known as “melting.”
• Solid to gas phase transitions are known as “sublimation.” In most cases, solids turn into gases only after an intermediate liquid state.