Medcalf: Why I’m choosing ‘you’ as my theme for 2025

The first day of 2025, for me, started with a revelation.

Somehow, time had elapsed more rapidly than I’d realized. Today, we are 25 years removed from the release of Sisqo’s “Thong Song” and Santana’s “Maria Maria,” both of which played incessantly on the radio then. In the theaters of the year 2000, “Remember the Titans” and “Meet the Parents” topped the charts.

But that acknowledgment — maybe I’m older than I thought — only lasted for a moment, as a string of “Happy New Year!” texts, both sent and received, bombarded my phone. My father recently added my name and number to our family reunion group chat, which only magnified the stream of celebratory messages. I am grateful, though, for the connection to a universe bigger than my own personal world.

And that’s my theme for the year 2025: you.

My resolution for this year is a decision more than a benchmark or goal: I choose community over calories. Now, I’m prepared to get to the gym five times a week and drink as many protein shakes as I can stomach like so many of us. But as I age — a younger colleague once told me I’m just “seasoned,” not old — my ambitions are more subjective than the annual checklist of objectives that we’re often encouraged to create every year, all before we’re met with a series of statistics that imply the futility of those grandiose goals.

Lose weight! Well, most of the people who try ultimately fail to stay consistent within a few weeks. Make more money! Might not matter in this unpredictable economy. Clean out the attic and basement! Call me in June and let me know how much progress you’ve made, OK?

Our resolutions, however, rarely involve people, in part because those goals are more difficult to measure.

How do you know, definitively, if you’re a better partner or spouse this year compared to last year? What’s the true measuring stick on the state of a friendship? And how will I assess, undoubtedly, if I’m the parent I strive to be in 2025?

Sometimes, the things that matter most don’t have a finish line. In 2025, I’d like to embrace those components of my life even more than I previously had.

My goal is to do more to create community in whatever spaces I exist. Yes, I want to read more books and take more trips and all of that fun stuff. But I’d also like to prioritize relationships, in whatever form they may take in my life.

I don’t believe everyone in my life will be a friend, but maybe they can be. My contacts on my phone are filled with folks I only know as acquaintances. That seems like a social opportunity, if I’m willing to take the initiative.

More gym time? More healthy meals? More relaxation this year? Yeah, I’m with it. But also more coffee, happy hours and lunches with people in my world — and those I have yet to meet. I guess I’d just like to make a greater effort to know and understand, well, you.

My celebratory New Year’s vibe stalled for a stretch after the reports about a possible terrorist attack in New Orleans, where a man rammed a car into a crowd of people early on New Year’s Day and killed multiple victims and injured dozens more.

I can’t predict the chaos ahead but I know we’ll need one another. Adding “manufacture a stronger community” isn’t as sexy on a vision board as “lose 15 pounds,” though I do think it’s fair to argue it’s more significant.

I think there are a lot of people in the Twin Cities and beyond who feel alone. Many people wrestle with bouts of loneliness, but there are folks who legitimately feel isolated and distant from the rest of the world. Some of those people may live alone. But I assure you that some of those folks are surrounded by people every day and still long for real, genuine bonds in their lives. They seek what we all need: connection.

While I don’t think I can solve everyone’s problems, I’d like to do my part in 2025 to explore the potential of the partnerships, friendships and relationships in my life and do more to build more connections and community. I don’t know how to post that on Facebook or Instagram like a six-pack of abs, a new car, a bigger job or the other luxuries that tend to occupy our lists of resolutions.

But my New Year’s resolution, if you’d like to call it that, is simple to name but more complicated to achieve.

It’s just a name: you.

Maybe I — and those around you — may find more space in your life and end up on your list too, as we all aim to create more community, even if we’re also counting calories in 2025.