I’m especially resistant to weight-loss resolutions. I’m frankly tired of hearing people deplore their bodies, and I’m sick and tired of them assuming that I feel the same way about mine. As I’ve mentioned before, my own relationship with my body is complicated, but it’s mostly a mixture of appreciation and tender protectiveness. I try not to deride my body despite the messages of inadequacy that bombard us all, and I try to take positive steps, not negative ones. When I exercise, I focus on getting stronger and feeling good, not on losing weight or looking different.

When it comes to resolutions, I focus on pleasure and self-care, not punishment and self-abnegation. Some of my oft-repeated resolutions from previous years: drink more champagne*; sing more; eat more eclairs.

I think I will make a resolution this New Year, and it’s one of celebration, not denial: dance more.

* I’m doing verrrrrrry well with this one.

For the moment, I’m directing my writing energy elsewhere, but I’ll continue to check in with little things — and little things can be good.

“You look a little beat, hon,” I said. “Did you have dinner?”

“Not really.”

It took me all of three minutes to whip up something simple for him to eat. As I gave him the plate and a beer, The Fella took my hand and quietly, earnestly said, “Thank you. Thank you for marrying me.”

Today is our second anniversary, and The Fella’s hatched some secret plans. (Nothing big, he assures me. Just secret.) The first item on the agenda: he got me an enormous coffee. Number two on the agenda: he’s doing laundry.

This guy gets me.

* [The Fella, don't hover over the links!] update Now that I’ve given The Fella his gift, I can describe it here. We’re going to have a mid-year variation on our Valentine’s day tradition of staying in with cheesy horror movies and pizza.

For the cotton anniversary, I gave The Fella the abominable-looking Lady Frankenstein, starring Joseph Cotten. Yeah.

Because it’s too hot to heat the oven, I’ll be picking up fantastic take-out pizza from Otto.

Wait for it… cotton.

I toyed with plenty of other gift ideas. For example, I thought about getting a really luxurious set of sheets, which we kinda need. Or towels, ditto. But I dismissed those as gifts for me, not for The Fella.

What did The Fella give me? A really luxurious set of sheets. And a really luxurious towel. Did I mention: this guy gets me.

- One Step Beyond! I’d never even heard of this Twilight Zone carbon copy, and now I have four DVDs of it, with its original Alcoa promos intact. Thanks to The Fella!

- Pajamas and pearls! (I ordered new pajamas, then made myself a new double-length string of pearls. Obviously, I’m going to wear them both right away.)

- Surprise bacon!

- Graduating from mooshy food to semi-soft food!

- Passover Coca-Cola!

- fresh-baked anadama bread, fragrant with molasses, chewy with oats and whole wheat, and hot from the oven. I love the way it fills the whole apartment with its rich, wholesome scent.

- wrapping Christmas presents, which gives me a marvelous calm feeling of accomplishment. And the penguin wrapping paper I picked up at Local Surplus & Salvage Shop is pretty darned cheery.

- snow! Granted, by the time I got outside in it, it was just lashings of cold and wet, but still: SNOW!

- hot tea with milk and the faintest lacing of sugar.

- anadama bread again, because it’s just that good. Also, because I’m making a second batch already.

- bright red coarse-weave fabric (also from Local Surplus & Salvage Shop) for reupholstering the Danish modern chairs Gaoo gave me. (She rescued them from the junk pile at our parents’ old house, so they’re endearingly familiar, too.)

- Nick Hornby’s About A Boy.

- The sweetest husband in the world, who knows me inside out and upside-down and who loves me with all my flaws.

So here’s to homemade strawberry liqueur, rich fuschia, fragrant, and sweet.

Here’s to almost empty matinee theaters, and walking out into the bright light all swimmy and disoriented.

Here’s to bright days and cool evenings.

Here’s to nieces and nephews who spend an afternoon making pretty platters of snacks in anticipation of your visit, and who crow and crowd around for hugs when you get there.

Here’s to a farmstand tomato on toast for breakfast, and a farmstand tomato on toast for lunch. (If we hadn’t run out, I’d be toasting a farmstand tomato for dinner.)

Here’s to a quiet Wednesday night date with the guy who knows you better than anyone ever has, and who makes you happier than anything ever did, and who wants to keep on doing that forever.

- go to the movies on a hothothot day. Really luxuriate in the air conditioning that chills you to the bone.

- spend more time with your niece. She’s full of surprises in the nicest way.

- get a haircut. You can’t keep your hands out of your hair because it feels so silky.

- file your nails. Look, you have hands just like a grown-up lady! (For about 12 hours before you snag a nail again, but whatever.)

- grapes. It turns out you like ‘em!

- open a bottle of wine just for yourself. That’s right, don’t wait for someone to share it with you. Pop the cork, drink a glass or two, and don’t worry whether you’re wasting it. Scandalous!

- kiss your husband. HARD. Make the most of the time you have together.

I smiled a little, shook my head, and told him I was fine. He nodded gravely. At my stop, we nodded and smiled again, both a little ruefully.

I wasn’t fine, but he couldn’t help me. No one could help me, because life sometimes brings sorrow and that’s just how it is.

Except that fellow passenger did help, just by reminding me that even strangers sometimes care about each other, and that the sorrow is outweighed by the caring. We are all traveling this road — at different paces and to different destinations, but we’re all on the same road, more or less.

I’ve never forgotten him. Thank you, fellow passenger.

1. The inaugural bottle: shared with AC at her place with J. and The Fella. Baked brie, savory pastries, and Buffy.
2 & 3. Nominally shared with E. (but actually I think I drank most of both bottles) at an impromptu cocktail hour at our place with J., R., and The Fella before going to see The Geek Chorus. Oof.
4. Shared with Gaoo before potluck pizza dinner. A. came over too! Wheee!
5. An evening cocktail party at our place to celebrate the morning soccer match.
6. & 7. Noir Might: Double Indemnity, The Maltese Falcon, and vegetable galettes with R, E, P, and The Fella.
8. AC brought over a bottle of sparkling pink! Very berrylike and fresh, a little sweet, and lovely with the last strawberry late at night.
9. After a two-week stretch of very-sick no-drinking, I shared a bit of a bottle at AC & J’s — the first time J & E joined us for Buffy night! It was also the first wedding anniversary for The Fella and me, and our friends surprised us with a tiramisu festooned with figurines, and an attempt at a happy-anniversary song. So sweet!
10. For a second first-anniversary celebration, a split of prosecco with polenta fries on the patio of the fancy-pants restaurant around the corner. I can check that off my summer list, too!
11 & 12. The first Buffy Might at J & E’s, with AC & J. Gorgeous dinner, great company, lots of bubbly including one that got cork-stuck… but The Fella got it popped.
13. Vinho verde with Gaoo, the sgazzetti contingent visiting from Bulgaria, and Gamma Suzin.
14. The Fella and I had a rare weekday date night together at home, and — to accompany a frankly delicious clean-out-the-fridge dinner — I opened a bottle of prosecco just for myself. That felt like a big deal, to pop a cork just so I could have a glass or two. I think I should do it more often!
15. Another Buffy Night, also Pizza Night. Mmm. The Ploob came along to AC & JE’s too, though he stuck to beer.
16, 17, 18. Buffy Night was Nostalgia Night at E & J’s: an enormous pile of grilled cheese sandwiches, three pots of soup of the evening beautiful soup, and three of us toughed it out through two and a half bottles of fizz. Go, team!
19, 20. Buffy night at AC & JE’s, and an excuse to celebrate the engagement of E & J! Go, team: we knocked back a bottle of cava, a bottle of vino verde, and who-knows-how-many bottles of High Life, the Champagne of Beers.

Wuh-oh! I lost track there for a while (not too surprising, I suppose, with all that bubbly swimming around). As of January 2011, I think we’re up to 27 bottles… and a Christmas gift from Mom included two more bottles, one big, one tiny one just for me. Aaaaand there’s a bottle of frizzante Lambrusco (or is that “Lambrusco frizzante”?) in the fridge, waiting for me to get around to it. I bought it for New Year’s Eve, but was taken down by the flu. I rang in the new year with ginger ale, not sparkling wine.

28-30: The Fella’s 42nd birthday party, a 12-hour open house with plenty of food and drink and silliness. While uncaging the cork of the second (third?) bottle, I set it down for a moment to introduce my sister to the assembled crowd… and we were all surprised by a popping sound. That’s right: an uncaged cork can apparently drive itself right out of the bottle and up into the air!

… which I suppose I could have inferred from the necessity for the cage. Right.

31-33. Though our out-of-town guest of honor had to cancel, our friends J & E braved a snowstorm to join us for cocktails and nibbles. We missed you, AC, but E & I soldiered on as best we could, knocking back three bottles of sparkling wine between us. Wowee.

34. SNOW DAY! In this snowy, blustery, blizzardy winter, The Fella has had to work through many many potential snow days… so in February, we decided TO HECK WITH IT and blocked out a day off as our own private snow day. (As it turned out, that was the warmest, sunniest day in months.) He provisioned a stack of movies and bags of food and we snuggled down in a cozy nest in our living room and enjoyed pretending to be snowbound.

35. A tiny split just for me, mixed with pulpy fresh grapefruit juice, enjoyed while The Fella and I had a quiet dinner.

36. Niece A’s 20th birthday party! Beautiful homemade pizza! Hugging! Photos of her trimester in Mexico! More hugging, and still more hugging — the girl’s been away for a TRIMESTER, y’all. I brought a bottle of vinho verde (and very nice for $3.99 — thanks, Trader Joe’s!) to share with Gaoo and Mom.

37. Dinner and movie with The Fella, and I broke open a bottle just for myself! Two glasses a night, two nights in a row.

38-41. “Mad Men” night with R., AC, E., and J. Despite the temptations of rye old-fashioneds and bourbon on the rocks, three fizzy-drinkers plowed through four bottles (including a too-sweet Asti, much improved by a drop of bitters). Nice work, folks!

42, 43. Dinner with Miko and LT at my apartment: spinach and mushroom galette, two bottles of a nice light vinho verde, Samuel James on the stereo, and talk of teleporters and living in the future.

44, 45. Dinner with most of my family: J, M, A, & A; N, S, J, & N; C; Mom; me. Two bottles of vinho verde to go with lobster rolls, corn on the cob, and a plate of farmstand cucumbers and tomatoes. Ahhhh, summer in Maine.

46-50: Halfway there! Buffy Night returns: AC & JE made a trip north to stay over; EB & JL joined us for cold peanut noodles, cucumber and avocado salad with sweet miso dressing. EB brought eclairs, JL brought homebrew! And we worked our way through 2 bottles of champagne and 2 bottles of vinho verde.

And a big bump: The Fella and I threw a Champagne Jam, an all-day breakfast buffet that’s just an excuse to drink pour cheap bubbly (and beer) for all our friends all Sunday long. I bought a mixed case + 1 bottle, an amount of sparkling wine now known as “a birthday dozen.” And we drank it ALL, as well as one bottle that a guest brought. That, plus the three bottles I used for cooking (and a bit of tippling) in the week leading up to the party, brings us up to 67 bottles.

68. Shared between brother B., SIL T., Gaoo, and me on Mom’s patio, enjoying the last lingering bit of summer and the sweet-tart fizz of a cheap but pleasant Lambrusco. B. offered a sip to teenaged L., saying “It’s what wine would taste like if it were sody-pop.” I’ll add that to the growing list of comparisons: cartoon wine, toy wine, candy wine.

69, 70. J & E came over for impromptu cocktails including a bottle of Lambrusco, a bottle of Christalino, and a few bottles of J’s homebrewed cider.

71. A bottle of non-alcoholic sparkling cider shared with SIL T, niece P, and The Fella during a lovely sleepover visit at our place. Hey, if we serve it in champagne glasses to celebrate, it counts!

72. A bottle of vinho verde I opened just for me — an indulgence that I’m finally getting comfortable with — during The Fella’s November vacation. I drank a few glasses during a night of board games, loosening up for An Experiment.

73, 74. An early Thanksgiving with The Fella’s family: I brought non-alcoholic sparkling cider, a bottle of cava, and a stack of recyclable plastic champagne glasses.

75. Actual Thanksgiving 2011: Pajama Thanksgiving at home with The Fella, snuggled up watching MST3K over a vegetarian dinner (plus chicken gravy) and a bottle of sparkling cider. (Yes, I’m counting it.)

76, 77. Christmas dinner at Gaoo’s with A., Mom, and The Fella: ham, scalloped potatoes, beet and goat cheese, roasted squash galette. Piles of prezzies, a kitten and a pocket laser, “Music from the Last Ten Years,” and laughing our asses off over snakes in a can.

Cheers to a break in the weather: a bright breezy day after days of rain.

Cheers to inspiration when it comes, and to dogged determination when it won’t.

Cheers to The Fella, who has a way with words that often makes me unexpectedly peal out laughter at the simple, hilarious aptness of his phrasing.

Cheers to that mixed case of cava and prosecco lurking under the table. When I bought it, I giggled giddily to the liquor store clerk and waggled my hands in excitement. Both The Fella and the clerk looked on with amused patience.

Cheers to the new champagne flutes I picked up for a song. It turns out my old glasses lasted so long only thanks to disuse; now that we’ve started, y’know, drinking out of them, they smash like eggs. I expect these will, too, but for once I’m not going to fret over material things. I’m going to keep picking up stray glasses whenever I see them for a buck or two, so I can enjoy the drinks and enjoy the bubbles and, every so often, enjoy the tinkling sound of smashing glass.

Cheers to my new shoes: not quite sneakers, not quite ballet flats, not quite half of the retail price. You are very easy and comfortable and I could walk a mile in you. This evening, I think I will.

Cheers to the library, and to my upcoming online Lolita book club and to Prof. Hungerford’s online lectures from the Open Yale Courses (Lectures 5-7). Now if I could just teach myself to say “Na-BOK-off.”