swapping breakfast and dinner for an upside-down start!

Happy 2024!!!

Yes, I realize it's a human-made construct, this partitioning of time into units like minutes and hours, weeks and years, mornings and nights...

and so, today was lived backwards!

Well, maybe not quite, and certainly not by design, but that's how it worked out.

(smile!)

Breakfast was hoppin' john, served alongside greens with some of Christy's Christmas ham, all gaily sprinkled with paprika for a festive, and tasty, start of my day and year.

How do we know that it's breakfast and not some other meal?

Well, there's the "Miyah's artwork" mug full of coffee as a hint.

(smile!)

Then Sandy came over and we took off for Asbury Memorial.

Odd destination for us, right?

Not quite!

The Burning Bowl Ceremony and Anticipation Celebration was to begin at 3 PM and she had wanted to be there, so I went, too.

Right place, right time.

How did I know?

The temperatures were back in the 60's for this one day, this first day of 2024.

Knowing this weather forecast, I had agreed to join Sandy for this experience.

Good call!

It's been years since I've done it, and I certainly had items to let loose.

In fact, when it came time for us to write down thoughts or behaviors we wanted to let lose as we began this next rotation around the sun, I ended up with seven slips of paper.

I dropped each one ceremoniously into the bowl of fire set up in the garden.

i thank You, God.

Then we all trooped back inside to write our letters to ourselves, letters which were ultimately placed into addressed and stamped envelopes.

That's going to lead to anticipation of the celebration we will feel when we read those congratulatory missives when we receive them in December.

Get it?

We write to our future self of our accomplishments during this year, hopefully planting the seeds of bright flowers of growth and happiness.

My words, not Cheri's, though perhaps I will suggest them for next year.

Speaking of flowers, I brought the remaining sheets of my "Tulip" stationary to share with the group today, and left the rest with her for future events.

(smile!)

After the two-hour ceremony, and all that energy used in writing two pages of words to myself, I was ready for a nosh or two.

Sandy was, too, suggesting we go somewhere neither of us had been before.

Hey, that sounds like a resolution I once had!

I think that one, of trying a new restaurant every month, may have been the only resolution that I kept for an entire year!

So, where did we go?

"Toast All Day!"

It's a new place on Broughton Street that she had heard of.

The weather was holding, so that's what we did!

Here's the funny thing: we were both wanting pancakes and eggs, but that was on the morning menu and no longer available at nearly 6 PM.

So we chose the next best thing: chicken and waffles!

I guess the chicken came first this time...

hahahaha! Hahaha!

Such a good way to start the new year: with a good friend, sharing a new experience!

i thank You, God.