2006 looked like it was going to be one of the worst years of my life (and that is truly saying something). Work had not bounced back after my largest client's merger, and I was barely subsisting on borrowed money and small jobs, telling my slumlord that the rent would be there soon, and not having the remotest luck finding any kind of day job to fill the gap (one incredibly promising interview turned out to be unsuccessful two weeks later because I was [seriously] "not bubbly enough" for a job doing legal research and drafting). Just as improvements in the work situation were in sight, I was served with eviction papers (THAT ordeal is described in a separate post "An Eventful Few Months"). Because the courts that handle evictions in my county in Ohio favour landlords to the point of actually openly flouting black-letter law, I was officially evicted on the day after my birthday. I had a week to clear off, so my mother and I frantically checked out every 'TO LET' sign we saw trying to find a new place to live. It didn't look good. To top things off, the day I had to be out of my old place, I also had to have my cat, who had been with me for half my life, put to sleep due to a sudden illness and her advanced age.

I hit repeated lows during this time, faced with the prospect of losing my home, of losing my livelihood (which had more or less absented itself), of financially burdening my already burdened friends and family, and reached new depths of desperation on numerous occasions. Those, however, were accompanied by reminders of what was right in my life. During one such time, I broke down into incoherent sobbing on the phone with my best friend, Karen. Her immediate response was to say 'There are people who care about you', which turned the sobs into a full-blown cry. She let me cry as much as I needed to (a lot), and told me to come over to her place. While waiting at the bus stop, I scratched down a journal entry, in which I noted, amongst other things that:

"This will either be my greatest failure, or my proudest moment."

Soon after my eviction, it proved to be the latter.

I found a new home, in all respects better than the former one. Through some well-played hardball, I also managed to obtain a settlement on the remaining claims from the eviction that was altogether satisfying. The first time that my name has ever been on the pleadings in a case in this country, and I caused my corrupt landlord and his rodent-like attorney, a woman who was as incompetent as a lawyer as she was unpleasant as a biped, to significantly revise their expectations of potential recovery. ("Final offer" my ass)

All of my contacts who had been laid off due to the merger had found other work and were sending work to me. Combined with the people I had met from the post-merger staff of my major client, work picked up beyond what it had been even at the high points of the past couple of years, and I finished the biggest job of my entire life - one that has put me in a position of greater security than anyone in my family has been in my entire lifetime - just this summer.

My relationships with my friends and family have kept getting closer, and my mother's private practise seems to me to be truly on the verge of success.

I welcomed a beautiful kitten into my new home this June. While he is quite deranged at times, and has left quite a few marks all over my body from trying to jump onto my lap when my legs were uncovered, I have watched him grow into a very affectionate little guy. When he was still pocket-sized, he used to flatten his ear against my sternum to listen to my heartbeat. Now, he comes to sit on my lap whenever he hears my voice. And through all of that, he still occasionally finds time to urinate on the futon that I intend to get rid of anyway, now that I can afford a proper sofa.

2006 was the first time that I have been unable to make it to the polls. I live in Ohio, so I don't think it's coincidence that my heavily Democratic precinct has its polling place in the middle of nowhere, where not even the buses go. I searched for it for several hours on foot with no luck. And yet, the results, for the first time since I've been voting, were not wholly catastrophic.

All in all, 2006 has certainly ended much better than 2005 did. Unlike in December 2005, I am going into the new year not with a feeling of imminent doom, but with some actual hope for the future. I'm not going to call it just yet, but I have a feeling that 2007 will be quite nice.