sarah eve kelly

1. What did you do in 2009 that you’d never done before?

I successfully defended my PhD research to scholars at Cambridge. I attended a May Ball (to wit: I wore a golden gown; I wore glitter in my hair and on my skin). I got real feedback - good and bad - from real editors at real publishing houses. I mastered Easy Sudoku.

2. Did you keep your New Years’ resolutions, and will you make more for next year?

Resolutions for 2009: a) to feel proud and less angry every day, or most days (no); to keep myself healthy (emphatic no); to keep working hard (yes); to see family and friends abroad more, viz. at all (yes); to be kinder and more attentive to the people I love (spotty).

Resolutions for 2010: to treat England like my home, rather than this place I’m on an extended visit to; to stop coddling myself and work harder; to rely less and less on other people; to drink more tea; to continually develop and redevelop real goals; to bake; to smile more.

3. Did anyone close to you give birth?

I’m at an age now when just about every woman I know is either pregnant, giving birth, or thinking about it. My dear friend Heather Goor had a beautiful daughter named Helena. Beyond that, there were about two dozen separate Big Conversations about The Future and Babies, with several different players involved.

4. Did anyone close to you die?

Thankfully, no.

5. What countries did you visit?

The United States in January and Canada in November-December.

6. What would you like to have in 2010 that you lacked in 2009?

Money.

7. What date from 2009 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?

There are no particular dates this year.

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?

This is a real tossup, because I struggled a lot with my research, and I struggled a lot with my writing. In the end I managed to make both pass muster - for the moment, anyway. I passed my first Cambridge defence with flying colours and I managed to turn critiques into a novel I feel very proud of. But these are nebulous achievements, always depending on what comes next. So I’m still working.

9. What was your biggest failure?

My attempt to develop a sane, circadian schedule, and to enter each day with a sense of excitement and leave it with a sense of achievement.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?

No, but I set myself up for both. I need to take better care of myself.

11. What was the best thing you bought?

This year wasn’t much of a year for buying, but I’d have to say my laptop. Though it went through a shirty phase and caused me no end of grief for a little while, it has a lovely springy keyboard and a massive hard drive and I’m very fond of it.

12. Whose behaviour merited celebration?

The extraordinary group of writers I found myself part of. No hacks, no whiners, no no-hopers - just a lot of talented hard workers who take a lot more shit than they deserve. I’m honoured to be among them.

13. Whose behaviour made you appalled and depressed?

I’m thinking of her name, but refuse to put it into such a public forum.

14. Where did most of your money go?

To tiny, death-of-a-thousand-cuts living expenses.

15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?

Going on submission to editors; moving back to London from Cambridge; starting my new novel.

16. What song will always remind you of 2009?

‘Such Great Heights’, Postal Service.

17. Compared to this time last year, are you:

i. happier or sadder? I’d say I’m happier - I spent a lot of this year trying to evolve, and I think I achieved that in a few small ways.

ii. thinner or fatter? Semper eadem, but I’m not as healthy as I was this time last year.

iii. richer or poorer? Unquestionably poorer.
18. What do you wish you’d done more of?

Same as last year: I wish I’d talked to people more. I wish I’d felt more urgency and initiative about things outside my work.

19. What do you wish you’d done less of?

I wish I’d spent fewer of my waking hours feeling afraid. My life has been set up in such a way that I have a massive net of love and light and well-wishers around me, and my fear has been hugely disrespectful of that. Notwithstanding it’s a waste of time and energy: things are what they are; things are what you make them. No sense being afraid.

20. How will you be spending Christmas?

As I always do, with my husband and mother-in-law right here at home. Love the lovely small Christmases.

21. How will you be spending New Year’s Eve?

No idea yet, but I’ve had my surfeit this year of parties that feel like rush-hour Tube carriages. Something quiet with good friends and good music.

22. Did you fall in love in 2009?

I stayed in love. I fell in love again and again.

23. How many one-night stands?

The Cambridge ladies just aren’t into that. Not any I met, anyway.

24. What was your favourite TV program?

I imbibed the BBC’s Robin Hood; I took in some Spooks; some Boston Legal; and some other stuff. But Grey’s Anatomy pretty much dominated my year in television, which the Me of June 2009 would scoff at pretty ceaselessly. But hell, what do I know: it’s a good show. Also, Law & Order has been absolutely bloody flawless this year.

25. Do you hate anyone now that you didn’t hate this time last year?

No. I try not to do that anymore. I almost wish I did: what I’m fighting this year is indifference.

26. What was the best book you read?

Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel was a novel that robbed me of all my words. There is no contest.

27. What was your greatest musical discovery?

Reid Jamieson is pretty great. PSAPP. Go Get Go. It was a year of good music, but no particular standouts.

28. What did you want and get?

An iPod Touch, courtesy of pretty much one of the best guys in the world, Colby Cosh. Some clarity about my PhD research, courtesy largely of me. A trip to Canada. Some time with my brother; time with my aunt and uncle; time with my cousins. As of Christmas, a netbook, which means that I have absolutely no gizmo-related excuses not to be a big genius next year.

29.What did you want and not get?

Security. A sense that I’m going where I need to go. I spent a few years of my life being able to trust myself for anything and everything, and I lost that; this year didn’t see it come back.

30. What was your favourite film that you saw for the first time this year?

It was a dismal movie year for me. Frost/Nixon was excellent, but didn’t push me where it hurts. Revolutionary Road was utter kaka. The Reader was all right but I don’t know if I like where it’s taking us. The Young Victoria was gawdawful. Mostly I didn’t see enough movies.

31. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?

I was in London, in our new flat, and I worked. Later we had a birthday/housewarming knees up and got our inaugural wine stain on the living room carpet. It was - no lie - the best birthday I’ve had in years, thanks to friends and loved ones. I turned thirty-one.

32. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?

Trusting myself; being self-sufficient; being confident.

33. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2009?

Static. Almost no new clothes were bought this year. I noticed I have a pair of legs; I put them to some use. Mostly my fashion concept involved losing beautiful earrings, and wearing - as usual - a lot of black, with the odd alarming red top thrown in. Cleaving to cleavage &c.

34. What kept you sane?

I’m not sure anything did, although that does my husband and close friends a terrible disservice. All the insanity was on my end this year, and it was both excellent and terrible, but do I have a single memory of taking a deep breath and seeing everything rationally? Not really.

(Although: writing group FTW. Those guys are awesome.)

35. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?

Katherine Heigl. My God.

36. What political issue stirred you the most?

Definitely not the MPs’ expenses scandal. I’m ashamed to report that my head was in the eighteenth century or earlier for most of this year - as it is most years. I’ll have to have a look round and see what’s happened.

37. Who did you miss?

My brother. I once had a e-brawl with an acquaintance of mine who had determined not to miss people who were far away, because what was the point, and my argument was that missing is involuntary, like an itch or a sneeze, and we can’t stare down our sneezes, yes? But now that there are so many people to miss, the missing has to be compartmentalized so that we don’t lose our minds. I don’t know if I’m happy about this, or relieved, or ashamed, but I try very hard not to miss people, and succeed in a spotty kind of way.

38. Who was the best new person you met?

I always think this is an unfair question. It puts you on the spot, and it puts the person - if there is such a person - even more on the spot. It particularly puts the people who aren’t that person on the spot. So in future: not answering this question. Also not answering it in the present. In fact, I’m determined that there’s a better meme out there somewhere.

39. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2009.

Some of the most extraordinary and wonderful of life’s experiences happen because we were backed into them, catapulted into them, dragged kicking and screaming towards them. You can prescribe a perfect life for yourself, and I can almost guarantee that it won’t make you happy. The unexpectedness, the obligation of life is what makes it three-dimensional and beautiful. Having the odd afternoon to yourself to write is an amazing thing; arranging your life so that every afternoon is given over to writing makes it exponentially less amazing. Do things that hurt you; do things that annoy you. It makes everything else feel just a bit more wonderful.

40. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year.

Wait, wait till you doubt no more
Wait till you know for sure
And you will wait too long

-Go Get Go, ‘Wait’

Happy 2010, my intrepid ones.

Till next time, &c &c.

Here it is: my wrapup of 2007, with my own postscript at the bottom…

1. What did you do in 2007 that you’d never done before?
Small question with big answer. I got married. I completed and defended a thesis and convocated with a Master’s degree. I moved to England. I got a National Insurance Number. I worked in Wimbledon and Tooting. I visited the back alleys of the House of Lords. I ate a mince pie. I made a birthday cake, and also a trifle, as well as stew and gravy (no, I’d never done this before). I put more than 200 pages into a manuscript that at several points I thought was hopeless. I tried drugs I’ve never tried before. I also did something that I can’t talk about, but that was very, very special.

2. Did you keep your New Years’ resolutions, and will you make more for next year?
I don’t think I did, except the one about saving money and saving some more to be able to write in England: that I did. Much of the good in this year required constant work, which I put in, but I absolutely failed to tackle the things that bother me the most about myself. And given that 2008 houses the last ten months before I’m thirty, I might want to turn my eye to those this year.

For 2008: to eat in a way that makes me feel good; to exercise more and regularly; to finish and sell my manuscript; to travel and travel and travel. Most emphatically, though: to have a plan, a proper one, on its way to fruition by the end of the year. I read something interesting the other day: If you don’t know where you’re going, any road will take you there. Should I be heartened or terrified? I’m me, so I choose the latter. I don’t want ‘any’ road: I want the right one. So 2008 will be about figuring out what it is and putting myself on it, and finally no longer behaving as though I’m still in the planning stages of ‘what I want to be when I grow up.’

3. Did anyone close to you give birth?
Yes! I now have a nephew, Mason, born to my sister Jessica in October. He is the spit of her, and the spit of my stepfather, which of course means that he’s gorgeous. My only regret is that I haven’t met him yet.

4. Did anyone close to you die?
No.

5. What countries did you visit?
It went like this: Canada, England, Canada, England, United States, England. I landed in England three times; who could ask for more than that?

6. What would you like to have in 2008 that you lacked in 2007?
A bigger plan. Greater financial security. Other than that, there wasn’t much I didn’t have in 2007; it was a year of great gifts.

7. What date from 2007 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
April 12. My thesis defence day, and something else, too.

June 5, my convocation day - even though I kicked and screamed that convocation was a waste of time - when Mike and many of the women I admire most were on the stage to see me not fall.

June 17, the day I got married. Almost more than that, June 16, the day that everyone who was there when I was born - along with many of my closest friends and family - got together for spaghetti in downtown Edmonton, seeing each other in many cases for the first time in twenty-eight years. I tear up thinking about it, as I’m doing now, and it’s lame, but I don’t care.

July 1, Canada Day, when Mike and I landed in England and he guided us to our new flat in Wimbledon Park. This was a year replete with wonderful days.

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
Big contest for that. My thesis defence was a big deal for me, because I don’t speak well and a committee like that is a scary thing for a little girl to contemplate. I got married without being disowned or tripping even once. I met my word count day in and day out between July and October, only several times wanting to kill myself.

I also figured out that I did, actually, drop my wedding band down the drain in the kitchen sink this morning. But it was Mike who fetched it out, so we’ll call it a draw.

9. What was your biggest failure?
I wasn’t kind to myself physically, to say the least. I also didn’t handle money with as much grace as I should have done.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
Enough to make me whine; not enough to merit mention here.

11. What was the best thing you bought?
Mike’s wedding ring.

12. Whose behaviour merited celebration?
If I started, I wouldn’t stop.

13. Whose behaviour made you appalled and depressed?
These guys’.

14. Where did most of your money go?
To travel and settling in. Other than that, good question. I was a completely kept woman for about two months this year, a condition that I could have probably been more graceful about.

15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?
All of it. Really: all of it. It became manifest around mid-January that all of this would be happening - finishing school, getting married, moving to the Old World, time for writing. I spent the first half of the year more or less beside myself.

16. What song will always remind you of 2007?
‘A Case of You’ by Joni Mitchell.

17. Compared to this time last year, are you:
i. happier or sadder? I don’t know. For all that.

ii. thinner or fatter? Despite efforts, night terrors and torment, exactly the same, I imagine.

iii. richer or poorer? Much, much poorer, but I knew that was coming.

18. What do you wish you’d done more of?
Walking, seeing, and sleeping.

19. What do you wish you’d done less of?
Meditating on destiny. It’s useless.

20. How will you be spending Christmas?
A London Christmas with Mike’s family. Still looking for a tree that won’t completely dwarf this place. One that I can bring home on the tube, too.

21. How will you be spending New Year’s Eve?
I still have no idea.

22. Did you fall in love in 2007?
Yes, again and again.

23. How many one-night stands?
Just one.

24. What was your favourite TV program?
This is a more complicated question than it seems, because for the first half of the year I parsed my viewing down to House, The Colbert Report, and hockey; and in July I relinquished television altogether. I thought it would be easier, but I realised quickly how much watching The Colbert Report at night meant bedtime, so bedtime was a muddy, uncertain thing for a long time. I also really, really miss hockey. I listen to some games in the middle of the night, but I’m by myself and tired and it’s not the same. So there’s that. But in the absence of television proper I’ve discovered some shows that hit and miss: I watched the entire lone season of Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip and enjoyed it, and I’ve loved The Office (US, interestingly) too. But I’d have to say the best of all was the complete Granada Sherlock Holmes series starring Jeremy Brett, which Colby got me for my birthday.

25. Do you hate anyone now that you didn’t hate this time last year?
No; in fact, I’ve been released from a lot of hatred that I felt this time last year.

26. What was the best book you read?
This is always the question that makes me realise that I have no memory for books, or very little: I read a lot that I enjoyed, but in terms of picking a favourite, I’m a bit stumped. I did really like Paula Spencer by Roddy Doyle.

27. What was your greatest musical discovery?
Kathleen Edwards, I think. It’s amazing how wonderful perfectly ordinary Canadian music sounds when you’re walking through Wimbledon. Blue Rodeo translates very nicely over here: it makes me feel like I’m carrying a secret.

28. What did you want and get?
Time for my writing; a husband; a beautiful flat; a lot of time with two close friends (they live in London, but I was uncertain of getting proper time with them, London being what it is).

29.What did you want and not get?
A really, really good job, and a completed manuscript that I could be proud of.

30. What was your favourite film of this year?
I was disappointed by films this year. My brother John will concur that Seeker: The Dark Is Rising was not up there.

31. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
I was interviewing at an agency that day; I also went shopping. I had a wonderful dinner with friends and got some supremely excellent loot. I was twenty-nine.

32. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
Completing my manuscript and finding good work. But those are both in the offing.

33. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2006?
Mostly: cheap. I didn’t get a lot of new stuff this year because I couldn’t afford to. And if I thought The Mall was an intolerable venue for shopping - I mean, fuck, at least it has a Taco Time (two, in fact, strategically placed) - I hadn’t reckoned on Oxford Street. British sizing and cuts were also a rude awakening. I’m only just now starting to get used to it, now I have some disposable income again. I need a pair of boots, badly.

34. What kept you sane?
Drugs, of course.

35. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
Nate Corddry and John Krasinski, easy. Not much on the ladies this year.

36. What political issue stirred you the most?
Most likely wildlife welfare, and the environment by extension. I realised something fundamental about myself: I care about the people I care about, but I do not care about people in general. I think the world has about five times more people than it needs, and I’m not interested in saving lives. I’m really not. It’s made me rethink the idea of having children. But animals need to be saved. Mike got me a polar bear for my birthday - they could be extinct inside fifty years. It’s terrifying. I think that my place is to support the organisations that need supporting, rather than lending my (meagre) talents to them, but the problem is now on my radar and unlikely to go anywhere anytime soon.

37. Who did you miss?
I miss a lot of people, far more than I’m used to. I miss Colby and Raechel. I miss my parents (all of them). I miss my whole family. I think I miss my brother John the most. The people whose easy presence I took for granted in the first part of this year - I miss all of them. I miss my workmates. I try not to spend a lot of time missing people, but pangs of it come to me more often than I like to admit.

38. Who was the best new person you met?
Hard to say. I’ve met a lot of interesting people - that’s what moving does. But I would have to say that my favourite of them is my stepmother, Beverly, even though I’ve yet to be in a room with her. Just by coming into my father’s life, she has made our family a stronger, better, closer thing.

39. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2007.
A lot of the time, humility isn’t the great thing it’s made out to be. I learned that I adopted humility as a primary characteristic because it was easy, not because I was actually humble. When you expend colossal effort to make something come about, humility drifts away more or less naturally, but it takes literally nothing at all to bring it seeping back.

40. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year.
You can meet me at ten-thirty
But I won’t be there, I’ll be gone
We can talk like we are friends,
going over it all again,
talking about everything I am doing wrong
(Kathleen Edwards, ‘Hockey Skates’)

Can you imagine us years from today
Sharing a park bench, quietly?
How terribly strange to be seventy
(Paul Simon, ‘Old Friends’)

Postscript. I don’t think this survey got to the meat of my year. It presupposes that the realisation of goals I set for myself last year would make me happy this year; it presupposes that I didn’t make any mistakes in my thinking and planning. I know now that I made a lot of them. I was too attached to some things and too glib about others; for all my efforts I know that I didn’t try in the right ways and did not exhaust my talents. The year that I can say I was all I was capable of being, I will be happy. For all the miracles 2007 manifested to me, this year was not one of them.