I was surprised to see that I have about five entries in the journal that are still set on "Draft" status.

Surprised, because it's telling of how blocked I've been when it comes to writing these days.

I'm not sure what's behind all this. Entries started, but turned to pitiful drivel that I couldn't bear to finish, and for all I know, this one will turn out the same. But here it is, the first day of a new year, and I feel compelled to do something to mark the day, to keep it from becoming just another twenty-four hour period of nothingness and sameness rolled together.

I look back on 2003 and try vainly to remember whether it was good or bad or neither. It was just a year, another twelve-month period that flew by too quickly, and it seems like just a few days ago that I was looking ahead at it and plotting a year of self-respect.

And for the most part, although I didn't achieve most of the specific goals I set out to tackle, I do feel a greater sense of who I am as a woman, and I feel calmer than I have in a very long time.

Maybe it's all in the quiet acceptance I've noticed inside that says I have been alone, am alone, and will be alone in the future - all because of one person who I can't seem to shake from my life, my mind, and my heart. Oh sure, there are days when I find this acceptance frustrating - Fridays, mostly, and holidays too are rough - but most of the time, I don't think about it at all. It just is.

There is liberation in finally acknowledging what you've spent so much energy trying to resist. But resistance is also an addiction of sorts, and it's easy to find yourself taking it up again, whether out of a sudden fit of anger at yourself for not fighting what you think you should, or out of the simple desire to be free of memories or people you feel might be holding you back from something spectacular.

That probably sounds backwards, doesn't it? It's the wrong approach, I should be doing the things that move me forward, not those that keep me stuck.

And I've tried, I really have. I've probably made more progress this year in that area than ever before, but at some moments, a woman just gets tired of working so hard to pretend she's not vulnerable merely because others expect her to be strong.

More than that, she also gets tired of being continually disappointed when she puts herself out there again, takes another chance when she swore that she would never, ever venture to let herself feel that glimmer of hope that leads only to hurt feelings - not just for herself, but for those who had no idea they were taking aim at a heart which wasn't available for target practice in the first place.

I don't always recognize myself these days, and that could be a good thing. Certainly, who I have been in the past hasn't gotten me any of the results that I wanted. But there are parts of me that I miss, the most important being the woman who had just discovered (after fifteen years of being completely disinterested in sex) that she had a hidden sensual side that she didn't know lurked deep within. Sadly, that woman had a short-lived existence, and I fear she's vanished away again to a place where she'll be unreachable once and for all.

Despite the moments when I feel that my youth slipped away when I wasn't looking, I'm lucid enough to realize that I'm still relatively young in terms of lifespan, and there are an awfully lot of new years to come before I should be giving up on the idea of love and happiness. I just try not to think of it, because I don't want to imagine what that could be like.

It seems patently unfair sometimes, though. There are days that I suspect I have done something quite awful to someone without knowing it at the time, and I'm receiving a hell of a karmic payback. I'm not an extremely religious woman, mainly because I have trouble believing in things I can't see or touch, but I have found myself praying recently. In the past when I've tried this, God often answered my prayers in the form of non-answer: not giving me what I thought I needed, and that actually turned out for the best, and I could look back and see the value in what He brought me instead.

But this year, not only did He answer my prayers, but He did so with a twist that only created more confusion for me, and I'm still having the occasional conversation with Him, trying to get Him to tell me what He didn't understand when I put that particular prayer out there. Was I vague, or is this just one of those times when I should just go along for the ride until the moment when His master plan is revealed? I'm just frustrated with trying to figure it out, because it seems like a bit of unnecessary torture to tease me with a half-answer this way.

Okay, so this entry is now weird and rambling and probably slightly incoherent, and it doesn't sound like I'm really in that place of acceptance I mentioned earlier, does it?

But wouldn't you have been incredibly bored if I'd said my life is perfect, and I'm in love with a wonderful new man, and I always think in straight lines and draw perfect conclusions no matter what the subject?

Yeah, I thought so.