One year my SIL (or was it that venerable source of info, the Women’s Magazine?) suggested that, instead of making New Year’s resolutions, her family list their accomplishments from the prior year. Normally, humans fret about what we didn’t do instead of acknowledging what we did do. It’s not too late to tally what you did in 2014.

This year, my SIL suggested picking a word for what they’d all focus on in 2015. I won’t tell you theirs, but my word was: FLÜGEN. Flügen is a delectable concept that can and must be spread in dire Modern Tymes.

But first, a digression. Like many, I’m fascinated by energy—its sources, conservation, and best use. I hate wasted energy, and I prize efficiency. One lean winter, horribly, this meant freezing my guests right out of my house. But mostly it means that I think of life (and death) in terms of energy. Everything from pebbles to peonies to polar vortices has its own particular energy, people included. Language has energy. Music. Wind. Rivers. Starlight. Coffee beans. This whole place is wildly energetic.

At events where everyone is dancing — the New World Festival, the Dead, a wedding – I often wonder if all that celebratory energy being generated is going somewhere that it’s used for some purpose, on this plane or another. I imagine a relay system, where the energy is transmitted far away to where it’s needed, to an orphanage or a war hospital or a marital dispute. I like to think it’s not just floating up uselessly into the ethers. That would be a waste.

One form of energy quite within our power is our thoughts. They came from other energy (from divine inspiration, random neural firings, Wheaties, who knows) and have untold power. Most things you see started with a thought. People survive horrific circumstances by choosing useful thoughts and banishing others. I sometimes wonder if when I felt so broke that I wouldn’t raise the thermostat: if only I’d spent that energy, that money, and warmed the house up, I’d have felt more hopeful and lighter thoughts might have brought better things (people, situations?) my way. I feel for workers in hard tymes now, with school closings and business failures. Maybe if they can mobilize hopeful thoughts, send out that kind of energy, new options will appear. Maybe the rest of us can send a buoyant energy their way. Maybe via joyful dancing or icy swimming —and writing the occasional check—we can hurry those options along.

Anyway, at Christmas one niece kept saying flügen for unknown reasons, so we made variations on it (flugenschluffer, meisterflugen). Weeks pass. I’m Googling flügen (umlaut?), so I can send my nieces my own (unsolicited) Word of the Year.  The Urban Dictionary (somewhat sloppily) says: “FLÜGEN was created in 2004. FLÜGEN is what you make of it, it’s a relaxed lifestyle, basically just going with life and enjoying it. FLÜGEN …can be anything and everything you want it to be. Some say it’s not a word, but a lifestyle … the beauty of FLÜGEN is that you can decide for yourself.” Interesting. Make what you want of it. Good deal.

For reasons I won’t go into, because they are unknown, a friend and I call each other variations on viscomte or vicscount, and comtessa or contessa, making an absolute mess of English, French and Italian to no good end. Usually these are alliterative titles, like Viscomte de Verisimilitude or Viscount of Villainy; Contessa di Chronic Fatigue or Comtesse de Corpuscle. But one day he called me Comtessa Von Flügen and, well, I haven’t felt the same since. Words carry energy; I now associate myself with the flügen “lifestyle.” I feel flügeny. Flugenesque things have been happening. And get this: people not married by my (advanced) age have had, as a consort put it, “a fairly comprehensive dating experience.” Meaning, in part, we’ve seen wicked bad road. But I’m feeling oddly lucky. Flügen springs eternal, apparently. I’m putting romance in the flügenhopper.

So try thinking differently. Try not catastrophizing in your mind. What if things magically fell into place? If you got a break? Spring is the perfect time – as the vortex weakens, the sap runs, Snowdrops emerge … the wheels of flügen are greased. I intend to summon all manner of ease in my new flügen lifestyle, and wish for you the same. Meanwhile, please know I’m grateful for your deep thots, your crazy words, and this vehicle to spread them intergalactically.  Thank you for reading, and relaying as you do to where needed. It’s not too late to list your accomplishments, select your Word of the Year, make yourself royal for unknown reasons, and/or convert to the flügen way. Report in as able. Good day.

Provocative Google Autofill of the Month:

When WHAT IS YOUR…is entered, Google autofills with:

-Name

-Spirit animal

-Name in French

-Greatest weakness