Call it the ceremonial paging of a new calendar, flipping the year from 2022 to 2023. In my younger days, the ushering in of a new year would almost certainly be accompanied by a late-night party with friends, a meandering brook of festive cocktails, streamers and noisemakers, highly impractical shoes (for a Nebraska winter, mind you) smartly paired with a bolero or skirt adorned with enough sequence to light up the midnight sky.

But now?

Now, in my early forties, I’m unbelievably content noting New Year’s Eve on my calendar, with a low-key gathering among family, a home-cooked meal, fleece-lined lounge pants and warm slippers by 8 p.m. (with an electric blanket or comforting heating pad), and a cup of caffeine-free tea for good measure.

Regardless of when we join the rest of the world on January 1 of any given year, we find ourselves in a potential place of transition. The opportunity naturally presents itself for change. Continue moving through life in the same form or fashion – or try something completely new.

And yet we’re given this precious choice for change each and every day of our lives. New beginnings can almost always occur on January 2, January 22, March 1, and so on.

For whatever reason – one I imagine I won’t fully understand for quite some time – writing in this space, with this voice, once again sounded appealing. Peppering these code-driven pages (and not those printed on paper and stored on a shelf) with my thoughts as words felt familiar and even a little bit needed.

After some digital housekeeping here and there, fixing broken HTML code and replacing old plug-ins with new ones, the pull to get back to my writing roots began to grow.

Even further hunting and pecking brought me to this meaningful piece of data: my first blog post went live on September 7, 2003.

Which means September marks TWENTY YEARS since I began filling this online space. My writing “career” began much earlier than that, but the writing I grew to love (accountable to no one but myself) began on a handful of long-forgotten blog platforms and eventually found a home here, at wendytownley.com.

And with a few years’ absence, two books, a thesis for graduate school, and freelance articles too numerous to count, I find myself called to begin again. Writing here as I’m called, when I have something to share or thoughts to digest, best served up beyond the boundaries (and distractions) of social media.

The countdown to September has begun. Let’s see where this road leads.