The Word is…

“Say the word and you’ll…”  You’ll what? Be a meme?  “No, that isn’t right.”
Be a me.  Nope.  Ah, it is “Be like me.”
At least that is what the Beatles said.  Play this music embed and read on about my struggle with this not a new thing, I know it goes back much further in time than this Happiness Project post, but I stopped searching when I found this use.  I don’t think it became a meme until this year.  (Digression: Oh crap, there is another word I need to write a post about.  The word “meme” and my time travels with it. )

There is a word meme going round.  I have tried to resist.  I even considered using the word “resist” as my word.  That was just too iterative, and self-negating for me.  It tripped the, “Wow, man” circuit.  And that is one little connection I try to never fire up.  I spent too many years attempting to inform the world that Later Born Baby Boomers are quite distinct as as a Baby Boomer cohort and we really should not be grouped with them at all.  So the word isn’t “resist.”
Besides, I don’t believe in resisting.  I believe in building new structures, paths, and understandings.  To “resist” is just to put energy into a system with which you disagree. I’m a “Field of Dreams” type girl.
The other thing I decided is that my word will not be one of the trendy ones.  One of the tried and true ones, maybe.  But not one of the trendy ones.  I only do trends before they are trends, n’est-ce pas?
It sure isn’t disrupt or any derivative of that word.  Neither is gratitude.  These are both perfectly fine words, great words, in fact, but frequent usage  does not mean that most people who use or select them personally understand  the meaning of the words.  Neither will my word be bipartisan.  I think this will be a big word in the fall.  But that would be foolish after so many decades of steady rightward shift.  Balance must be restored, but for me balance is not a simple meeting in a middle, no it isn’t the the right word either.
Resolutions or words, it makes no difference.  This year will be for me to organize.  My files?  Maybe.  A movement?  Perhaps.  My life?  Always. But is it my word? Nope.    Two solid weeks of thinking about this has finally brought me to the understanding that I am a nerdy, techy person, so what I need is something, well, structural.  When I realized this I knew what my word for 2014, the Year of the Horse, the year I turn 57 having been born in 57 (that has to be a magical number) is (Can you hear the drum roll?) infrastructure.
Infrastructure inspires me.  Infrastructure motivates me.  Infrastructure simplifies everything when created properly.  Infrastructure is what our country has neglected that has led us to where we are.  Infrastructure is cool.  Rachel Maddow says so.  If asked, the 11th Doctor, the Raggedy Man, would say so too… along with singing the praises of bow ties, fezzes, and 10 gallon hats.
So, tah dah, my friends – you will be hearing a lot about tech, organization, and infrastructure both here, and on my business site, Hill Research Service’s Research and Content during the next many months.  It is going to be a good year.