January 1 is the year’s equivalent of 5am in the morning. The same dazed stillness and the same feeling of expansive possibility that may or may not be an illusion.

I’ve filled the day with modest firsts. The first page of a new journal, the first walk. The first bird I spotted this year is brown creeper. I’ve decided to keep a journal and a tally of the birds I meet and I have no idea if any of these micro-resolutions will stick, but I find comfort in these small things.