Five Years a Writer

At both our house and cottage, we use hooks to hang our clothes. Sure, we have closets, but hooks keep the clothes handy by where they’re needed and, added bonus, we can see what is available within easy reach. This habit of clothes management is not sophisticated, but it works. I plan my day’s outfit (a term I use only loosely for my sartorial style) by what’s still on the hooks and not yet dropped into the laundry basket. As I have been pondering the end of this year and the beginning of the next, I have realized that my planning for the coming 12 months is not dissimilar to how I plan for the day’s clothes: I use a hook. I have a broad objective. And I’m prepared to pinch hit with what’s available, as needed. The hook is a word (or several, maybe) that guide me in the broadest sense. I don’t want to be tied into a master plan that can’t be amended along the way, but I equally don’t want to wander through time without any sense of direction. For 2022, I chose the word ‘plan’, meanin...