2025: ANNUS MEH-ABILIS

2025 was definitely a year that met the chronological requirement of being 365 days. Only it felt much longer.

Has there been a more perfect microcosm of 2025 than this final month of the year? Two weeks ago I was trudging through 5 inches of snow taking pictures around Cincinnati, while yesterday I was watching people walk their dogs wearing shorts and t-shirts (how they got in t-shirts and shorts I’ll never know—sorry for the Groucho Marx aside). This morning we have returned to a blustery winter wind and warnings of severe weather as I scrambled to retrieve the merino wool liners and socks I had just buried in my bureau. Next I’m expecting the ball at New Year’s to stop midway down the pole and slide back up just to prolong our collective ambivalence regarding the perfectly forgettable year of 2025.

Of course with a setup like this, you might be expecting a political screed, a cultural diatribe, or even a series of algorithmically derived lists a la Spotify Wrapped, but I think you can find those elsewhere and by writers of greater renown and insight than I. (See the end of this post for the expected end of year flotsam and jetsam). Instead, I am choosing to discuss a more momentous chronological division in my life than the mere turning of the calendar: retirement. 2025 will forever be remembered by me as the year Janus moved ahead six months to July. I will now refer to the events of my life as taking place either BR (Before Retirement) or AR (After Retirement). Those speeding tickets I got in 2024 and May 2025? Those took place in BR. Ancient history. Cleaning the basement and learning how to make the perfect omelette? AR. A new beginning. A fresh start.

I’m not going to go into any detail about what led to the decision. After 30 years of teaching, I was ready for something else, but I will definitely miss the adult students I had the great privilege of meeting. As to what comes next, I’m not ready to discuss that either. The truth is I don’t really know what the future holds, but I do know that I am committed to trying new things in this AR life—such as running and swimming—along with continuing this photography thing to see where it leads me. I also know that I am ready to say good riddance to 2025.

I am reminded of the following stanza from the poem by Naomi Shihab Nye, called “Burning the Old Year.”

So much of any year is flammable,
lists of vegetables, partial poems.
Orange swirling flame of days,
so little is a stone.

So much of what came BR is flammable, I think, though I don’t want to discard all of it. Instead I’ll focus on the next stanza:

Where there was something and suddenly isn’t,
an absence shouts, celebrates, leaves a space.
I begin again with the smallest numbers.

I am ready to start again and hopefully take the lessons forward. So, instead of here’s to 2026, I will say, here’s to AR!

End of Year Flotsam and Jetsam:

Selected Books Read: The Odyssey (Emily Wilson translation), Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, Plato’s The Republic, God of the Woods, The Gales of November, On the Road, The Dharma Bums
Favorite Jazz Albums: Strange Heavens (Linda May Han Oh/Tyshawn Sorey/Ambrose Akinmusire), Of the Near and Far (Patricia Brennan), About Ghosts (Mary Halvorson)
Other Delightful Musical Discoveries: Tether (Annahstasia), Tchaikovsky: The Seasons (perf. Yunchan Lim), Cruel Joke (Ken Pomeroy), Bach: Sonatas and Partitas, Vol. 2 (perf. Chris Thile)
Favorite New Flavor of Tic-Tacs: Sour Apple!
Favorite Marital Event of the Year: My wife and I celebrated our 30th anniversary with two concerts: Rachel & Vilray and MollyTuttle!
Best use of my time AR: The Museum Challenge of 2025. Check out my two blog posts on those!
Worst use of my time AR: Organizing my office. It will never be organized.

I’ve also included my favorite pics from this past year in no particular order.

Snow Bridge

The bend near the Treemont Institute on the Middle Prong of the Little River in GSMNP in Tennessee after the January snowstorm.

Cottonwood Visitor

Bison watching in Cottonwood Campground in Theodore Roosevelt National Park, ND, during my May booktour.

A Hitch in the Git-Along

One of the covered wagons on display at Scotts Bluff National Monument in Nebraska taken during my May booktour.

Blood and Sand

The lunar eclipse of 2025 as captured over Sandstone Falls, WV. This is a composite image of the blood moon, the starry sky and the falls.

A Rainy Night in Cincy

A rain-soaked jaunt along Riverside Drive in Covington in February led to some moody pics of the Ohio River, the Roebling Bridge and these fine-feathered friends.

Night Owl

After wrapping up my book tour in May in Telluride, CO, I headed out to Owl Creek Pass to capture the Milky Way over Chimney Rock. A well-timed campfire from neighboring campers helped illuminate the trees in the foreground.

A Night in the Garden

A composite image taken in Garden of the Gods, Illinois, in October.

History of the Ohio River

A panorama taken during the Cincinnati River Roots Festival in October. I think I captured almost the entire history of boating on the Ohio, with apologies to dugouts, kayaks and flatboats! I will post more about this event shortly!

Let's Follow the Sun

It was my first time to visit Lesher Poultry Farm in Pennsylvania, and words will fail here. Over 200 acres of golden joy emanating across the rolling hills and in the eyes and smiles of everyone I saw and met. Taken in September.

Dream Lake

Surprisingly, I had never been to the Cincinnati Nature Center in the fall, so I decided that one of my first wrongs to right in retirement would be to visit! This is the walkway next to Powel Crosley Lake.

It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like...

We don’t get many snowstorms prior to Christmas in Cincinnati, so I made sure to make the most of it this year. Here is Riverside Drive this December.