Michelle Kaplan

You Say You Want A Resolution?

I made a New Year’s resolution that I actually kept. At 16, I resolved NEVER to make another New Year’s resolution. Yeah, it’s a cop-out, but it was an honest look at resolutions and a way not
to fail, and hey, I kept it all these years — no problem.

Maybe why resolutions are so hard to keep is that we set ourselves up for total failure. This year I will or will not — fill in the blank.
The standard: I will: Lose weight, exercise, and
eat according to the government issued food pyramid (except when hospitalized).

The sensible: I will not: drink and drive, attempt to smuggle a Bic lighter onto a commercial airplane, I will not let my elderly relative retain his license without being tested annually so he doesn’t drive through a neighbor’s garage and into the backyard pool.

The unlikely, but needs to be addressed anyway: I will not pout at the gas pump as I remember the good old days. I will not stuff packing peanuts in my cheeks in a poor attempt to imitate Marlon Brando as the Godfather. (Those suckers melt in your mouth – yuck).

Maybe we’re being too specific. If we toned it down a bit, we might actually resolve what we resolved to do in the first place. (Is that right?) Let’s face it; this has been a very intense year. Tsunami’s, hurricanes, floods, tornado’s, hurricanes, and hurricanes, and did I say hurricanes? Maybe Mother Nature has a resolution with our name on it. I think we need to lighten up.
Maybe we should… Let’s take this year to resolve to just be kinder to ourselves, and yes, even others. Let’s resolve to make a resolution that might actually be, dare I say it, fun to resolve.

Let’s resolve to: Take a breather, stop and smell the roses, eat more ice cream, take
in more sunsets, kiss more passionately, have more sex, give into those guilty pleasures, take the road less traveled — take a walk on the wild side.

Maybe we should resolve something fun and unrestricted, how about resolving to do something that is just completely unexpected of our usual selves. Or resolve just to “go for it” more.

Who said resolutions should be painful? The average Joe deals with enough pain day
in and day out just living in the real world. If resolutions must be painful, let’s give
them to those that deserve them. Here are some resolutions I would suggest for the
following:

I, Tom Cruise, resolve to stay away from furniture.
I, Katie Holmes, resolve to stay away from Tom Cruise.
I, Tom Delay, resolve to find a scapegoat.
I, Michael Jackson, resolve to get help.
I, Michael Brown, resolve to watch the news.
I, Harriet Miers, resolve to get a real job.
I, JLo, resolve to get married only twice in a year.
I, Britney Spears, resolve to take the JLo resolution and, on the second time around, marry someone who can hold a job.
I, Jeb Bush, resolve to seek the governorship in a state that has less natural disas-
ters.
I, Oprah Winfrey, resolve to screw something up already.
I, Richard B., AKA– Dick Cheney, resolve to give 1/4 of 1% of my earnings from Halliburton to those poor suckers that lost everything due to those greedy bastards at Enron.
I, Elijah Wood, resolve to make that great leap from the closet – c’mon.
I, Jessica Simpson, resolve to support dolphin safe tuna or chicken.
I, Jennifer Anniston, resolve to keep my dignity and shut up.
I, Brad Pitt, resolve to have a little sensitivity.
I, Angelina Jolie, resolve to revamp my lousy public image of a tramp by pretending to be Audrey Hepburn…oops, already done.
I, Al Franken, resolve to run for the Senate…just do it.
I, the entire Democratic Party, resolve to give us a real candidate that we can all get behind.
I, Hillary Clinton, resolve to run for president with Bill Clinton on the ticket as Vice, why not?
I, the Supreme Court of the United State of America, resolve to stop taking away our civil liberties.
I, Paris Hilton, resolve to hide in a corner until I have something intelligent to say. I think that’s hot.
I, Donald Trump, resolve to end the Apprentice before it becomes a cliché — too late.
I, George Bush, resolve to read a newspaper, learn to speak English or get the citizens of this country a Bush to English dictionary, get closer to the truth, or the telling of the truth.
So do me a favor, before the clock strikes midnight on December 31st, make a fun resolution.
I can’t — I have one to keep.