Happy 10th Anniversary to BITNF! It’s time for me to both celebrate and bid adieu to this blog. A very big THANK YOU to all my family and friends who have followed along on these personal writings over the past decade.
I published my first post here 10 years ago today while living in the Seattle area. The initial intent was to do something creative again while documenting plans for minimizing my stuff, retiring from a corporate job, and moving back to Nova Scotia in 2017. Last year’s happy birthday BITNF gives a good summary of the blog’s history so I won’t rehash it all here, but I will call out 1) over 10 years, I published 205 posts and 2) after 10 years, I still like the blog’s name.
This past winter and spring, I didn’t feel like I was going Forward (or Back) but rather merrily off on a variety of tangents per usual. I get enthused for a while. And enthused must be good. May was a great month to give myself a kick in the butt about my health, diet, and fitness. After reading here and there about the benefits (cardio and strength training) of walking with a weighted pack (formerly known as Rucking), I filled a backpack with water bottles and went for a walk. Well, I instantly loved it because, of course, it was exactly what I did when I was training to climb Mount Rainier. It also involved planning a schedule of incrementally adding weight and, if you’ve read this blog for a while, you know I love to PLAN. Well, that gave a new purpose to my walkies until the heat waves and high humidity took the wind out of my sails.
Since the last autumn equinox, I’ve been hanging a seasonal decoration by my apartment door. I have made these (by simply sewing a seam at the top for a wooden dowel) from Japanese Tenugui towels. A lot of Japanese art and textiles feature the seasons and I love this idea of changing up things in the décor to acknowledge the current season. I recently discovered there is the idea of 72 micro-seasons in Japan so I went off on a tangent reading about that. Since Nova Scotia has a five-month winter and a short spring, I might need to create micro-seasons customized for here. For example, rather than Mist starts to linger, February 24-28 might better be represented with Ennui starts to linger.
I’ve always celebrated the anniversary of BITNF but lately have decided to add a lot more celebration to my life. Like changing the door decoration with the season. Like going for a pedicure on the summer solstice. As noted in 6 to 60, turning sixty in October feels very significant to me. At the 4-months-to-60-years-old mark, I took myself out to lunch. Then I decided to do this at the 3, 2, and 1 month marks too. And after officially becoming Ye Olde Sheri? I’ll continue to celebrate the good luck of being another month older.
Thanks again for following along! This last post, #205, will mark the sunsetting of BITNF at the 10-year mark. The blog will be left in maintenance mode until summer 2025.
Related links:
- 6 to 60 (post #204)
- happy birthday BITNF (post #196)
- why back is the new forward (post #1)