Old Hen, Same Trick

 I’ll never confess my specific goals for 2025 (remember, no accountability!) but one of my goals avoids another 2-year hiatus between articles, so here I am!

2025 has already been worse than expected (impressive!). In the midst of grappling with what to cluck about and being annoyed at my goal setting, there was a devastating plane crash killing many members of the figure skating community. The year already had me mostly humorless, then this just sharpened a dagger into most of my remaining levity. But once I flapped a few feathers out from full despair and numbness, I vowed my next article would cluck about skating in some way. Figure skating doesn’t get much exposure anymore, but it’s still a challenging, demanding yet beautiful sport to which athletes devote much of their lives. Stories deserve to be shared and figure skating deserves more exposure and respect. I don’t have a following like ESPN (yet!) but I hope my 2 followers and Ukrainian bots enjoy this.

2025. Who Is She?

 2024… Welp.

2025, here we are! Buckle up!

2025. well, shit.

But on day one two of the new year, here I am. Here we all are. Meteors (hopefully figurative) and pandemonium will keep coming, and we’ll still be here. Whether it’s surviving or thriving or sleeping, that’s an accomplishment in itself.

I’m way out of “comebacks.” I’ll always have excuses, but those aren’t funny. So I’ll just be here, on day one two of 2025 and onward. We’ll all be here together. Me and all 2 of you who read this.

I have actual “goals” for The Hen in 2025, and I’m not sharing them. I can’t fail if no one can hold me accountable! HA! But I will say I am here TRYING; trying my best to still share some cackles or something and write some words for my petite coop, even if they’re not all published. (You’ll never know about my spring hiking trip where I kept startling a midwestern woman! Sad!) So flying into a new year, Hen is taking a new approach to writing, at least for this article. Since most of us here would like a RE-DO for 2024 but can’t get one, I’m focusing on unsolicited advice that’s helping me thrive (mostly…sort of… MOMMY!) in the hangover of 2024. And you can trust me: all my therapists say I’m doing really well.